Marine Le Pen believes for the first time that the Vel d’Hiv roundup was ordered by “the French authorities”

Seven years after denying France’s responsibility, Marine Le Pen has changed her tune. The National Rally MP paid tribute on Tuesday 16 July to the victims of the Vél d’Hiv’ roundup, stressing that it had been ordered by “the French authorities”. The far-right leader previously believed that “France was not responsible” of the roundup, according to her statements in April 2017. At the time, she was questioned about Jacques Chirac’s decision to recognize, in July 1995, the responsibility of Paris.

“On July 16, 1942, the French authorities scarred France by ordering the infamous Vel d’Hiv’ roundup. The victims of this tragedy do not only belong to History. Their torture and their memory remind us that the scourge of anti-Semitism has not disappeared and that it feeds today on hate speech from the far left and Islamists who have targeted our Jewish compatriots,” wrote the three-time presidential candidate in a text published on X.

Although she publishes a message every year in tribute to the victims of these arrests, this is the first time that she has mentioned “the French authorities”. As of Tuesday afternoon, she had not responded to AFP’s requests. In July 1942, more than 13,000 Jews were arrested at the request of the Nazis and on the orders of the French government in place during the Occupation. Parked at the Vélodrome d’Hiver, they were then sent to Nazi extermination camps.