I think they are too friendly with Israel and are picking up some bad habits.
"In France, Gypsies go into hiding after camps destroyed" by Lori Hinnant | Associated Press, August 19, 2012
GENNEVILLIERS, France — The camps weren’t much to begin with: They had no electricity or running water. Grocery carts served as makeshift grills. Rats ran rampant, and fleas gnawed on young and old alike.
How big are their rats?
But they were home — and they were better than the new reality for thousands of Gypsies who have been forced into hiding after France launched its latest campaign to drive them from their camps.
The last big sweep came in 2010, when France expelled Gypsies to Romania and Bulgaria. Then the European Commission imposed sanctions, and thousands of French protested in sympathy for the Gypsies, also known as the Roma.
Related: France's Genocide of the Gypsies
This time, the Gypsies left quietly — gathering their belongings and heading into the woods — with plans to reemerge when the coast is clear.
“Why did God even create us, if Gypsies are to live like this?” said Babica, 35, as bulldozers moved in to tear down the camp in Gennevilliers, on the outskirts of Paris. He did not give his last name in fear of arrest or deportation.
The Palestinians of Paris.
Most of the Gypsies have no plans to return to Romania, where their citizenship would at least allow them to educate their children and treat their illnesses. Amid a dismal economic environment across Europe, they say, begging in France is still more lucrative than trying to find work where there is none.
France has cast the most recent demolitions as necessary for public health and safety. It is hard to pinpoint how many camps were taken down. At least five around Paris were demolished, and several hundred of their residents were ordered out; others came down in Lille and Lyon.
This time, France’s Interior Ministry said, the camps were demolished in accordance with legal guidelines agreed upon with the European Union.
“Respect for human dignity is a constant imperative of all public action, but the difficulties and local health risks posed by the unsanitary camps needed to be addressed,” the Interior Ministry said. In no case, the government said, “did the removals take the form of collective expulsion, which is forbidden by law.”
It wasn't, huh? Because the government said so?
Mina Andreeva, spokeswoman for the European Commission, said the executive body is studying the situation.
The Roma Forum, which has ties to the 47-member Council of Europe, condemned the evictions, saying they contradict “President [Francois] Hollande’s commitment from his election campaign to not expel Roma families without proposing alternative accommodation.” It is not clear whether France consulted any Roma before moving in on the camps.
Yes, this is a VERY SURPRISING MOVE from the leftist/socialist. It's something you would have expected from a Sarkozy.
Human Rights Watch said 240 Romanian Gypsies evicted from camps around Lyon in southern France left on a charter flight to Romania after accepting 300 euros for a “voluntary return.”
Related:
"Roma advocates countered the repatriations were hardly voluntary, claiming that those who refused the deal would end up in holding centers and eventually be sent home without funds."
I $uppo$e I would take the money.
The French government has offered no hard numbers on how many Roma camps have come down, or how many Roma have been evicted.
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Related: Sunday Globe Special: France's Femme Fatales
Let's fill in the week and be done with France for a while:
"Riot engulfs troubled French district in north" by Lori Hinnant and MILOS KRIVOKAPIC | Associated Press, August 15, 2012
AMIENS, France — Months of tension between police and young people in a troubled district of northern France exploded Tuesday, with dozens of youths facing off against riot officers in a night of violence....
The immediate cause of the riots was unclear, but a standoff between police and people attending a memorial for a young man who died in a motorcycle accident may have been one trigger. Officials underlined that police were not involved in that death.
The eruption of violence shows how little relations have changed between police and youths in France’s housing projects since nationwide riots in 2005 raged unchecked for nearly a month, leaving entire neighborhoods in flames in the far-flung suburbs.
The sister of the young man who died in the accident said it was impossible for people in her community to even speak with police.
“As soon as they see young people, it’s to handcuff them or harass them,” said Sabrina Hadji, 22. “The dialogue is completely broken.”
Free France.
Anger was still running high when Interior Minister Manuel Valls arrived in the neighborhood Tuesday afternoon. A small group of people tried to push through Valls’s security detail as he walked through the area, alternately booing him, cursing him, and trying to speak to him.
More politicians need that kind of treatment.
One shouted, “When are you going to speak to us?” before the minister ducked into a building to meet with the mayor, the head of the local prefecture, and Hadji and her mother.
Valls, who used to represent an impoverished area outside of Paris in Parliament, showed anger himself, expressing disbelief that police officers had been shot at.
“Shooting a police officer? Burning a school? And then questioning these forces? It’s intolerable,” he said at a news conference. “Nothing excuses shooting at police officers and burning public buildings.”
While he took a tough line in saying that order had to be restored, he added that the residents of the neighborhood are the primary victims and said his door would always be open to them.
Relations between police and youth in housing projects have been troubled for years, perhaps decades....
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Also see: Airplane passengers are asked for gas money
France deploys troops to Syria-Jordan border
Globe was quiet on that last one, sigh.
