A Bataclan survivor calls for an “anti-terrorism Grenelle” in France

In an article published Tuesday in “Le Monde”, the president of the Life for Paris association calls for an “anti-terrorism Grenelle” because according to him, “there is no plethora of good-level scientific studies on the subject of radicalization”.

“We have a reflection which is always relatively short-term” regrets Arthur Dénouveaux, Bataclan survivor and president of the Life for Paris association, guest on franceinfo on Wednesday December 6. He is the author of a column on the fight against Islamist terrorism published on the Le Monde website. He calls for an “anti-terrorism Grenelle” to better understand the phenomenon and carry out long-term reflection on the issue.

franceinfo: You are calling for an “anti-terrorism Grenelle” in France to take stock and think about this question in the long term. In your opinion, this reflection does not exist in France?

Arthur Dénouveaux: It seems to me that we have a reflection which is always relatively short-termist, in emotion, and always under a security prism, focusing on the latest attack to date. It’s characteristic. When it was Arras, there was talk of an obligation to leave French territory. Here we are talking about psychiatry. Does that form the framework for global thinking? I do not have that impression of it. So yes, I believe that there is a need for an assessment because a lot of things have been done and a lot of things are working. We must see that we thwart many attacks and that our justice system manages to judge terrorists, so we are not helpless. However, the number of people tempted by violent jihad in France is not decreasing, there are many French people who are themselves radicalized by French people, and if we do not start to tackle this question, the source, we will continue to try to empty the sea with a small spoon.

In your opinion, we still have a very poor understanding of radicalization in France?

There is no plethora of good scientific studies on the subject. What we also see in the courtrooms is that there are explanations provided by academics such as the radicalization of Islam, the Islamization of radicalism or, more recently, Hugo Micheron who, very interestingly, spoke of the preaching factories that had been set up in Europe. This explains a good part of the phenomenon, but when we look in the boxes, we see that there are always people who escape this categorization, which is proof that we cannot completely understand the journey of radicalization.

Is it a lesson in humility, this difficulty we have in understanding this phenomenon?

It’s very good to have humility. This is what will allow us to move forward and this is what is a little lacking in political thinking at the moment on the subject.

“We must admit that it is a frightening phenomenon, which harms us and that despite the degree of violence suffered by France, we do not yet know what to do”

Arthur Dénouveaux, president of Life for Paris

at franceinfo

This is why a Grenelle is useful: we will bring together academics, people who went to the courtrooms, journalists, judges who presided over these hearings, lawyers, social workers and people of National Education. We are going to try to break down the barriers a little to understand the phenomenon in its entirety.

It is a phenomenon which also evolves over the years, which is difficult to grasp. Terrorism today is not the same as five or ten years ago…

No, we have an enemy who is extremely intelligent, who observes us keenly and who has been able to adapt his method of recruitment and his mode of action. So, at the moment, the news is that the terrorists do not have a rear base with sufficient funding to really plan operations like that of November 13. So, we are facing a kind of low-cost terrorism. You take a knife from your house and you go and stab people in the street. It doesn’t cost much and it causes extremely strong fear and discussion in society.

Foiling attacks is one thing, tackling radicalization is really a very different undertaking?

Yes, thwarting attacks is obviously fundamental. As a victim, I am happy every time we avoid making new victims. But the attack arrives at the very end of the race. It’s when jihadism is already anchored, when we already have a cell, it’s when we already have a desire to take action. And the idea is still to do prevention. You cannot cure a disease by only treating these symptoms.