Anti-Israel protesters rally across France, defying ban imposed after synagogue clash

Haaretz
July 19, 2014

REUTERS - Thousands of pro-Palestinian protesters marched in French cities on Saturday to condemn violence in Gaza, defying a ban imposed after demonstrators marched on two synagogues in Paris last weekend and clashed with riot police.

French President Francois Hollande said he understood emotional responses to the killing of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip in a flare-up of hostilities with Israel but would not allow violence to spill over into France.

"That's why I asked the interior minister, after an investigation, to ensure that such protests would not take place," he told journalists during a visit to Chad.

Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve justified bans in Paris, the Sarcelles suburb and the Mediterranean city of Nice by saying the security risk was too great, prompting outrage from left-wing and pro-Palestinian groups.

He had asked police in cities to examine security risks city by city and, where necessary, to issue ban orders.

The far-left New Anticapitalist Party, an organizer of last Sunday's rally and the banned one in Paris, urged protesters in Paris to defy the ban, prompting police to issue a warning.

"Those who do not respect the ban, in support of protests or against them, face the risk of being stopped, arrested and handed over to the courts," Paris police said in a statement.

Read the entire article

France taxes rich and business to slash deficit

Reuters
September 28, 2012

(Reuters) - President Francois Hollande's Socialist government unveiled sharp tax hikes on business and the rich on Friday in a 2013 budget aimed at showingFrance has the fiscal rigor to remain at the core of the euro zone.

The package will recoup 30 billion euros ($39 billion) for the public purse with a goal of narrowing the deficit to 3.0 percent of national output next year from 4.5 percent this year - France's toughest single belt-tightening in 30 years.

But with record unemployment and a barrage of data pointing to economic stagnation, there are fears the deficit target will slip as France falls short of the modest 0.8 percent economic growth rate on which it is banking for next year.

The budget disappointed pro-reform lobbyists by merely freezing France's high public spending rather than daring to attack ministerial budgets asSpain did this week as it battles to avoid the conditions of an international bailout.

"This is a fighting budget to get the country back on the rails," Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault said, adding that the 0.8 percent growth target was "realistic and ambitious".

"It is a budget which aims to bring back confidence and to break this spiral of debt that gets bigger and bigger."

Read the entire article

Lightning hits French president's plane, none hurt

Fox News
May 15, 2012

PARIS –  Socialist Francois Hollande took over as France's president Tuesday and jetted off to Berlin hours later for talks on Europe's debt crisis — only to have his plane struck by lightning. No one was hurt.

The Falcon 7X aircraft was hit by lightning shortly after take-off Tuesday, and returned to the Villacoublay air base outside Paris as a precaution for inspection, Defense Ministry spokesman Gerard Gachet said.

Defense officials say the president and his entourage were transferred to another aircraft, a Falcon 900, and took off shortly thereafter. Hollande is due to meet with German Chancellor Angela Merkel to discuss Europe's financial crisis.

It was a stormy presidential beginning for a man who promised to be a more "normal" president and less flashy than predecessor Nicolas Sarkozy.

Hollande walked up the steps of the Elysee Palace in Paris and walked out Tuesday as France's first Socialist president since 1995, taking the helm of a country worried about Europe's future and pledging to make it a fairer place.

The 57-year-old rode to the presidency on a wave of resurgent leftist sentiment amid Europe's debt woes and protests against capitalism around the world.

After a ceremony steeped in tradition, Hollande displayed his populist touch with a rain-soaked ride up the Champs-Elysees avenue, standing tall in his vehicle's sunroof to wave to crowds lining the streets before getting out for handshakes with adoring crowds.

Hollande then left within hours on his first diplomatic foray to Berlin, following a postwar custom for new French leaders to reach out to their German counterparts to solidify European unity. He also named a moderate, Germany-friendly member of his Socialist party, Jean-Marc Ayrault, as his prime minster.

Hollande and Merkel are in different camps, however, when it comes to solving Europe's debt crisis. While new figures Tuesday showed the 17-nation eurozone has avoided a new recession, thanks largely to Germany, new political turmoil in Greece was reviving fears about the fate of their shared euro currency.