By Bouna Mbaye

Tens of thousands rallied across France to protest the racist murder of Aboubakar Cissé, rising Islamophobia, and the government’s move to ban Urgence Palestine.

On May 11, tens of thousands of people marched in the streets of Paris and several cities across France to protest against Islamophobia, Anti-Black Racism, and the attempts of the French Government to ban Urgence Palestine, the largest pro-Palestinian/anti-genocide organization in France.

Islamophobia Kills

The nationwide Rally against Islamophobia was a response to an atrocious assassination that took place inside a mosque two weeks earlier. 

On April 25, 2025, Aboubakar Cissé, a 22-year-old citizen of Mali, was stabbed 57 times while he was performing prayer in the Khadija Mosque in Grand-Combe, a tiny city in Southern France. 

This hate crime triggered a nationwide shockwave, especially among the Muslim Community. As the investigation unfolded, it was revealed that the murderer, who was eventually arrested in Italy, justified his crime by invoking his hatred towards Islam and Muslims, but also the fact that Abubakar was Black. “He is Black. I am going to do it!”, the murderer reportedly said.

As last Sunday’s marchers pointed out, this hate crime did not happen in a vacuum. In fact, over the past two decades, anti-Muslim, anti-Black, and racist discourses have been normalized in French mainstream media but also in some political circles.

Ahmad Ibrahim, a Palestinian activist and member of Urgence Palestine and Perspectives Musulmanes – one of the co-organizers of Sunday’s March against Islamophobia – told The Palestine Chronicle that “the government and the media are building Islamophobia in France” 

Among the banners deployed by the marchers in Paris, one of them read “Islamophobia kills. The State and the Media are complicit! Let us Resist!” 

Omar Alsoumi, one of the Palestinian founders and leaders of Urgence Palestine, told us that “it is important to be here today, at this rally, not only for our martyr but also to explain the political context of what is happening in this country.

“Aboubakar Cissé was murdered because of Islamophobia, which is one of the weapons that the colonialists have been using against our people, in Africa, in Palestine, of course, in Asia, and in our diasporas here in the Global West,” he added. 

In this context, several of the grassroots organizations involved in Sunday’s March also called for the repeal of the Islamophobic Laws, including the 2004 Law, which banned the veil in public schools in France. 

Islamophobia and the Crackdown on the Palestine Solidarity 

On April 30, less than a week after the abominable assassination of Aboubakar Cissé, French Ministry of Interior Bruno Retailleau announced his intention to ban Urgence Palestine, the largest pro-Palestinian Organization in France, which was founded by Palestinians in France in October 2023, following the launching of the genocidal campaign against the people of Gaza by the State of Israel, with the support of the United States and the European Union. 

It is noteworthy that Bruno Retailleau, who is currently running for the presidency of the right-wing Party Les Républicains (which gathered 7% of the votes during last summer’s parliamentary elections), maintained his campaign rallies and did not visit the mosque where Aboubakar Cissé was murdered until two days later. 

On March 26, Retailleau attended a rally organized by Elnet, a prominent pro-genocide organization with direct links to the Israeli Government. The French Minister of Interior concluded his speech at a rally, which many observers, including French journal Mediapart, described as islamophobic, by proclaiming: “Down with the veil!”

In this regard, Ahmad Ibrahim also highlighted that “Palestine is no stranger to the issue of islamophobia. Because when Netanyahu, his government and Israel in general, fight or perpetrate a genocide against the Palestinians, they use an Islamophobic narrative against us.”

“The genocide in Palestine also encourages racist people and parties to unleash their hate speech against Muslims”, he noted. 

According to Ibrahim, “they think that if the genocide, the deportations of an entire people, in front of the whole world, is possible in Palestine, so why not here, with the Muslims, Black people, Arabs and Asians? This is why this rally is very important and why the presence of Urgence Palestine is also very important” 

For his part, Omar Alsoumi thinks that “Islamophobia is fabricated and spread by the Zionist Lobby, who use Islamophobia to silence our communities and to silence the solidarity with the Palestinian people. Islamophobia kills in France but it is also part of the genocide; it’s part of the structure which enables and arms the genocide against our people in Gaza and Palestine.”

Urgence Palestine

Omar Alsoumi also spoke about the prospects of Urgence Palestine, a coalition he co-founded 18 months ago.

 “First of all, resistance is in our minds, in our spirits, in our hearts. We are not afraid. We know that our cause is the cause of justice, the cause of freedom and we received a lot of support after this stupid decision of the French Ministry of Interior. So we are fighting, and we will always be fighting,” he told The Palestine Chronicle. 

“It is not the first time that the house of a Palestinian has been destroyed by the occupation or by the colonizer. But we will build and rebuild. We will defend and protect this house. […] We will not let them ban Urgence Palestine. And we say it again: they cannot ban, they cannot dissolve the legitimate resistance of the Palestinians,” Alsoumi added.

“We will struggle and we will fight until we can return to our land;  the Land of Palestine. From the River to the Sea, this Land has to be freed from oppression and colonialism. And this also implies that we stand strong here, as diasporas; Palestinians, Arabs, Muslims, Africans, Asians, we have a tremendous role to play in the imperialist metropoles, here in France, in the UK, in Germany, in the US and all over the world”.

Meanwhile, the attempt of the French Government to ban Urgence Palestine has triggered an unprecedented wave of solidarity, resulting in a petition that was signed by over 200,000 people within a few days.

(The Palestine Chronicle)