The poulets are coming home to roost

France has always been at the vanguard of the move to accommodate radical Islam. Whether it’s refusing to enforce UN sanctions against Iraq, refusing to join the coalition in Iraq, undermining Israel, or fawning over Arafat, you can count on the French for groveling, self-interested appeasement. It’s appropriate, therefore, that the French should be the first to demonstrate the inevitable effect of appeasement: those to whom you pander will invariably turn on you. If you read LGF, you’ll know that the French have for weeks been defending against increasingly aggressive attacks from those suburban “youths” wwho such a significant part of its up-and-coming Gen Z.Recognizing France’s inability suddenly to produce backbone, those same youths are leaving the banlieus, packing guns, and taking the battle to some more serious targets than just cars:

Youths forced passengers off three buses and set them on fire overnight in suburban Paris, raising tensions Thursday ahead of the first anniversary of the riots that engulfed France’s rundown, heavily immigrant neighborhoods.

No injuries were reported, but worried bus drivers refused to enter some suburbs after dark, and the prime minister urged a swift, stern response.

The riots in October 2005 raged through housing projects in suburbs nationwide, springing in part from anger over entrenched discrimination against immigrants and their French-born children, many of them Muslims from former French colonies in Africa. Despite an influx of funds and promises, disenchantment still thrives in those communities.

About 10 attackers – five of them with handguns – stormed a bus in Montreuil east of Paris early Thursday and forced the passengers off, the RATP transport authority said. They then drove off and set the bus on fire.

Late Wednesday, three attackers forced passengers off another bus in Athis-Mons, south of Paris, and tossed a Molotov cocktail inside, police officials said. The driver managed to put out the fire. Elsewhere, between six and 10 youths herded passengers off a bus in the western suburb of Nanterre late Wednesday and set it alight.

***

The overnight attacks and recent ambushes on police have raised concern about the changing character of suburban violence, which is seemingly more premeditated than last year’s spontaneous outcry and no longer restricted to the housing projects. The use of handguns was unusual – last year’s rioters were armed primarily with crowbars, stones, sticks or gasoline bombs.

Regional authorities said the Nanterre bus line, which passes near Paris’ financial district, had not been considered at a high risk of attack. Francois Saglier, director of bus service at the RATP, said the attacks happened “without prior warning and not necessarily in neighborhoods considered difficult.”  (Emphasis mine.)

By the way, do note that, while the article starts with that useful noun “youths,” by the third paragraph we’re hearing that they’re mostly Muslim.  I wonder how long it will take before that information finally appears in the first paragraphs of these stories.