Backdoor criminalisation of revisionism confirmed by Scotland’s most senior judge

This afternoon in Edinburgh the President of the Court of Session, Lord Carloway, rejected the appeal against extradition to France of Vincent Reynouard, the exiled scholar whom Parisian courts seek to jail for his research questioning orthodox history of the ‘Holocaust’ and the ‘massacre at Oradour’.

Regular readers of H&D and the Real History blog will be familiar with the background to the case. Vincent was arrested in the Scottish fishing village of Anstruther in November 2023 and has been held in Edinburgh jail for the past fourteen months, despite not being charged (let alone convicted) of any crime under UK law.

France is one of many European countries which criminalise any historical and scientific research questioning the orthodox version of the ‘Holocaust’: the alleged murder of six million Jews in presumed homicidal gas chambers during the Second World War. But Parliament has deliberately avoided passing any such law in the UK. Instead, UK courts – including now Lord Carloway, Scotland’s most senior judge – are engaged in a cowardly criminalisation of revisionism via abuse of other laws such as the Communications Act, and via abuse of the extradition process.

Lord Carloway, Scotland’s most senior judge, today rejected Vincent Reynouard’s appeal against extradition. In doing so, he effectively sought to criminalise historical revisionism in Scotland without the inconvenience of parliamentary debate or legislation.

This conveniently avoids any parliamentary debate on the merits of the revisionist case. Though the historicity of the ‘Holocaust’ was not a legal point at issue during the trial, and though he has not indicated any competence of his own on historical matters, Lord Carloway assumes the right to declaim on “the patent falsehood” of Vincent’s work. Lord Carloway makes statements about the Auschwitz death toll and about the notorious ‘confession’ of camp commandant Rudolf Höss, though no expert witness testimony was adduced at any stage of Vincent’s extradition process about these matters.

Lord Carloway does not himself claim personal expertise in 20th century history and does not indicate that he has carried out even a single hour of documentary research on such topics. Notably he relies on the Höss ‘confession’. In what other case would Lord Carloway be happy for a Scottish court to rely on a ‘confession’ obtained by torture and blackmail, or on submissions concerning the scene of the crime that were provided by the Kremlin’s military and intelligence services?

The version of history laid down by the Nuremberg trial – instituted by the victors of the Second World War, and largely based on ‘evidence’ by a Kremlin-controlled ‘commission’ – is protected in France by the ‘Gayssot Law’ enacted in 1990, appropriately enough on the initiative of a French Communist MP allied to a millionaire Jewish socialist.

This ‘Gayssot Law’ was designed to criminalise the work of the pioneering revisionist scholar Professor Robert Faurisson, who though born in Shepperton, West London, to a Scottish mother and French father, lived and taught in France throughout his adult life, latterly as Professor of French Literature at the University of Lyon.

Professor Robert Faurisson (above left) with Giuseppe Fallisi (above right) who has since founded the Robert Faurisson International Prize in the Professor’s memory.

From the mid-1970s until the day before his death in 2018, Professor Faurisson wrote and published detailed research into the alleged ‘gas chambers’, summarising his conclusions in a famous sentence:
“The alleged Hitlerite gas chambers and the alleged genocide of the Jews form one and the same historical lie, which has permitted a gigantic political and financial swindle whose main beneficiaries are the State of Israel and international Zionism and whose main victims are the German people – but not their leaders – and the Palestinian people in their entirety.”

It is a curious coincidence that the Court of Session judgment rejecting Vincent Reynouard’s appeal was delivered one day after Professor Faurisson’s birthday, and a few hours before what has in recent years become a worldwide festival of historical ‘remembrance’ – Holocaust Memorial Day. In 1995 Faurisson directly addressed “Auschwitz: the facts and the legend” in an essay now available online at the Robert Faurisson website.

Vincent Reynouard spoke at the conference in October 2018 – organised by H&D in Shepperton, the Professor’s birthplace – at which Robert Faurisson gave his final speech, a day before his death. Vincent (who was awarded the Robert Faurisson International Prize in 2020) is today’s leading representative of the Faurissonian tradition of scholarly re-examination of the ‘Holocaust”s evidential basis, while the courts (both in Paris and now sadly in Edinburgh) have abandoned scrutiny of evidence and now prefer to genuflect in submission to ‘Holocaustianity’.

Most of the Western world has moved away from organised religion, but ‘Holocaust’ memorialisation has become a pseudo-religion, with Auschwitz-Birkenau as its Calvary and anti-revisionist legislation as the new blasphemy laws.

Vincent Reynouard in Shepperton, West London – Robert Faurisson’s birthplace – for the Professor’s final conference in 2018, organised by H&D

Though the UK has no such laws, Lord Carloway affirms in his judgment that Vincent’s online publications are extraditable offences because they can be deemed “grossly offensive” under s.127 of the Communications Act 2007. This is an updating for the internet age of a law originally designed to criminalise obscene telephone calls.

In this instance, the law has been stretched to cover offending “members of the Jewish and other communities whose members perished at Auschwitz and Birkenau.  The same applies to those living with the memory of Oradour.  It is not necessary to be a member of the relevant communities to be grossly offended by such statements; any reasonable person would be.”

Lord Carloway makes the dire implications clear: “Although it is not an offence to hold these views and, in certain contexts, to express them, it is a breach of section 127 of the 2007 Act to communicate them to the public on the internet.”

By Lord Carloway’s implication, online revisionism is to be deemed criminal in the UK, even when expressed in scholarly terms, and even without a specific parliamentary statute.

This is a blatant attack on fundamental human rights: an attack on the basic principles not only of UK law but of European civilisation’s accepted intellectual standards.

We shall report soon on the next stage in the fight for Vincent Reynouard’s freedom and the fight for real history.

Vincent Reynouard’s appeal heard in Edinburgh

The appeal hearing in the case of Vincent Reynouard was heard in Edinburgh on Thursday, 11th January 2024 before a panel of judges of the Court of Session.

Regular readers will remember that Vincent was arrested fourteen months ago and has been held in Edinburgh jail ever since, despite not being charged (let alone convicted) of any crime against UK laws. The French authorities are seeking his extradition under their notorious ‘Gayssot Law’ which forbids any questioning of historical orthodoxy regarding the ‘Holocaust’ and certain other alleged events of the Second World War.

Here is a translation of Vincent’s report which first appeared in French at Vincent’s website (the report also now appears in German and in Spanish at the Real History blog):

My lawyer was more incisive that in the trial of first instance.

After recalling that the videos that are the target of French prosecutors mainly dealt with the Holocaust, he emphasised that I challenge official history with rational arguments, without polemicising.

Then he came to the fourth video, which deals with the Jewish question.

“Mr. Reynouard,” he said, “declares himself in agreement with Hitler on the existence of a Jewish problem. This statement may shock, even alarm. However, when he claims to go further than Hitler, it is not to incite murder, quite the contrary. My client explains that going further in his reflections, he deduces that the Jewish problem arises from the faults from which our societies suffer (loss of spirituality, hedonism, etc.).

“The sentence which states this was omitted from the arrest warrant on which the trial judge relied. However, it is crucial, because it explains that my client does not advocate the genocide of the Jews or the eradication of Judaism. At first instance, the judge also recognised that Mr Reynouard was not calling for the extermination of the Jews.

“I add that, unlike Alison Chabloz, my client is neither satirical nor sarcastic: his speech is calm and thoughtful.”

The late Richard Edmonds presenting the Robert Faurisson International Prize to Vincent Reynouard

At this point, a judge intervenes to declare that the assertion that Hitler was right to denounce a Jewish problem was itself grossly offensive. My lawyer replied that the message should be judged not by extracting a few statements, but by considering its totality.

Then, he recalled that the United Kingdom had refused to criminalise revisionism.

“Mr. Reynouard,” he concluded, “is a revisionist. He is being prosecuted for this reason. Ordering his extradition by invoking Section 127 of the Communications Act — a section that was originally intended to crack down on obscene telephone calls — would be an abuse of that law.”

Speaking in his turn, the prosecutor said: “Mr. Reynouard not only denies the Holocaust; he also disputes the massacre of Oradour by the SS, which left 643 victims.” With this allegation, the prosecutor wanted to present me as a madman who denies the deaths of civilians, which I never did. The aim of this dishonest manoeuvre was to undermine the defence contention that I rely on rational arguments.

The prosecutor continued by asserting that the trial judge had correctly analysed the grossly offensive nature of my videos, but he did not dare to claim that by declaring that I went further than Hitler, I was manifesting “terrible anti-Semitism”, because that would have been really too ridiculous.

Then, he considered the question of whether I’d had committed a breach of public order law. We remember that at first instance, the judge dismissed this accusation. The prosecutor maintained that this was an error: “There is a risk that the videos targeted by French prosecutors could be viewed by a certain section of the public who, after listening to Mr Reynouard, will be incited to perpetrate anti-Semitic acts.”  Here we recognise the main argument of the opponents of freedom of expression: “You can express yourself freely, provided that your words do not risk inciting hatred among certain people.”

Edinburgh’s Court of Session, where Vincent Reynouard’s appeal was heard on 11th January 2024

My lawyer replied that in my videos, I did not call on anyone to act, but that I encouraged viewers to think by providing them with food for thought, which is unrelated to the sort of violent messages, such as racist insults, satirical-sarcastic songs, shouting and unambiguous gestures, which are ordinarily judged as undermining public order.

The judges will make their decision on February 1st. At the end of this hearing, I will not hazard any predictions, for one simple reason: everything will happen in the heads of these three judges whose state of mind I do not know.

In reaching their judgment, they will have the choice. If, out of respect for freedom of expression, they wish to release me, then they will accept the Defence arguments. Otherwise, they will favour those of the Prosecution. They will not have to answer for their decisions, at least in this life.

However, I remain calm, because whatever the outcome, I will serve the revisionist cause. Some say that I would be more useful in freedom than in prison. I think that’s not necessarily the case. Suffering repression also allows us to bear witness to the truth. Future generations will note: “He put forward rational arguments and offered fair debate; they pursued him as far as a remote corner of Scotland and gagged him.” The facts will lead to inescapable conclusions.

Shortly before boarding the prison bus, a guard whispered to me: “You are a hero. Yes, a hero.” I don’t think I’m one; I consider myself a man who fulfils his duty to his people. However, this mark of respect coming from a simple civil servant touched me. I see it as a sign from Providence which indicates to me that, in the shadows, my work is spreading and revisionism is progressing.

I will never give in.

Thanks again to everyone who supports me.

Peter Rushton’s report on the initial trial of Vincent Reynouard is still on our website. Further discussion of the case and its implications for revisionism will appear both in H&D and at Peter’s Real History website.

Revolutionary praxis: the strategy of street protest

During recent days British and European nationalists have had to choose when and how to engage in street protests. H&D’s assistant editor Peter Rushton offers this introduction to the strategy of street protest in 2023Este artículo también está disponible en traducción al español.

Isabel Peralta on the frontline of the barricades in central Madrid this weekend

Spain is rapidly becoming ungovernable as patriots (including our European correspondent Isabel Peralta) take to the streets in protest against the squalid and treacherous amnesty deal offered to Catalan subversives by Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez. Meanwhile in London, the career criminal Stephen Yaxley-Lennon – better known as ‘Tommy Robinson’ – is attempting another political comeback as leader of counter-protests against supporters of Palestine. And in Paris, the main opposition leader Marine Le Pen, past and future presidential candidate for the nationalist party Rassemblement National (formerly the French National Front) has marched on a pro-Israel demonstration.

What factors should be borne in mind by racial nationalists when deciding whether to adopt a strategy of street protests?

First and foremost, we should focus our minds on the protest’s objective. This might seem obvious – but sadly in 2023 many nationalists are only too keen to put on their marching boots merely in order to “do something”, because they are frustrated by the evident crises of European society and the apparent inability of nationalist parties to mount a serious political challenge (following, for example, the collapse of the BNP into a mere fundraising channel for its corrupt and indolent leaders).

Taking the three examples above, the most obvious case is the Parisian demonstration which was solely and blatantly intended as a rally for Israel. Marine Le Pen’s stance was welcomed by none other than Serge Klarsfeld, the leading French “anti-nazi” now aged 88 who has longstanding ties to Israeli intelligence. Klarsfeld told the conservative newspaper Le Figaro: “when I see a big party of the far right abandon anti-semitism and negationism and move towards our Republican values, naturally I rejoice.”

Marine Le Pen with two of her leading allies, Jordan Bardella and Sébastian Chenu, joined a cross-party march in Paris on Sunday against ‘anti-semitism’ and in defence of Israel.

H&D readers will understand that I’m not rejoicing. But neither am I surprised. This weekend is merely the culmination of a longstanding relationship between the Le Pen dynasty and Israeli intelligence services, who have at last succeeded in taking over both of the main political parties of the French “far right”.

Tommy Robinson’s call for British patriots to descend on London and oppose pro-Palestinian demonstrators was only slightly more complicated. Robinson came to prominence in 2009 as leader of the English Defence League (EDL) with an explicitly anti-Muslim agenda. Though it was avowedly “anti-racist” and had numerous non-White activists, the EDL grew just as the BNP was starting to implode, and it attracted many people who would once have been BNP supporters.

Though he has been discredited several times in the past decade, Robinson is heavily promoted by the media and is still viewed by some sincere nationalists as a leader of something that vaguely resembles our patriotic cause. He is especially popular with football gangs and others who are (often for honourable reasons) eager to confront the enemies of White Europe on the streets.

But the objective of last Saturday’s call to action in London was obviously fraudulent, as both H&D and Patriotic Alternative leader Mark Collett were quick to point out.

A wide range of reactionaries including Tory newspapers and then Home Secretary Suella Braverman (an Indian married to a Jew) amplified Robinson’s false claim that the Cenotaph was threatened by pro-Palestinian marchers (mainly of alien origin). The fact is that Saturday’s march for Gaza was never going to threaten the Cenotaph, or even pass down Whitehall.

Crook and fake ‘patriot’ Tommy Robinson (second right) displays his true loyalties with this disgusting hybrid flag before last Saturday’s shambolic anti-Palestinian protest in London

In other words the central objective of Robinson’s rallying cry was fraudulent. Its objective was primarily to embed British nationalists (a tiny, fragmented and downmarket version of Marine Le Pen’s party) as explicit allies of Zionism. And secondly to divide, misdirect and discredit those patriots who might otherwise contribute to building a genuine racial nationalist challenge to our treacherous political elite.

Robinson’s motley crew managed to be both ‘bad optics’ for nationalism, and to represent a counter-productive, fundamentally flawed ideology. As was once said by a French analyst (and misattributed to the statesman Talleyrand): C’est pire qu’un crime, c’est une faute. It’s worse than a crime, it’s a mistake.

By contrast the central objective of the continuing demonstrations in Madrid is entirely valid: to oppose the break-up of Spain. This national betrayal is a cynical deal by Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez, leader of Spain’s fake ‘socialist’ party PSOE. As Isabel Peralta explained in issue 116 of H&D two months ago, Spain’s party political circus resulted in an inconclusive parliamentary election. To obtain a majority in Madrid’s parliament (the Cortes), Sánchez must cut deals not only with his main allies on the extreme left, but with an assortment of Basque and Catalan regionalist/separatist parties.

Among these is the hardline Catalan separatist party Junts, whose leaders have been fugitives from Spanish justice for several years. They were convicted of sedition and other crimes after they set up an illegal ‘referendum’ as part of an unconstitutional effort to secede from Spain. And despite being politically conservative in other respects, their anti-Spanish conspiracy won the support of the usual international gallery of anti-European subversives, including the ‘Scottish’ Pakistani lawyer Aamer Anwar, who began his political career as a Marxist vandal smashing the Rudolf Hess memorial stone near Glasgow.

Sánchez has offered an amnesty to Junts for its leaders’ crimes. The Prime Minister himself is deliberately subverting both the Spanish constitution and the rule of law, merely in order to obtain a parliamentary majority to sustain himself in office. The situation is in some ways similar to Britain in 1913-14, when the Conservative leader Bonar Law denounced a pact with Irish ‘Nationalists’ designed to keep Liberal Prime Minister Asquith in office:
“We do not recognise the Liberal cabinet as the constitutional government of a free people. We regard them as a revolutionary committee which has entered by fraud upon despotic power.”

Anti-government protesters last night chant at Madrid police: “It’s 10 o’clock: go ahead and tear gas us again!”

In response to the outrageous amnesty deal, Spanish patriots have turned out for the past ten nights in central Madrid, confronting massed ranks of armed police outside the headquarters of the ruling PSOE. Elderly Madrid residents alongside football gangs; conservatives, civic nationalists, Falangists, and national socialists; all these and more have packed the streets of their capital city, and the authority of the Sánchez government is crumbling.

Therefore, in the case of the Madrid demonstrations – in stark contrast to Paris and London – the objective of the street protests is clearly valid and worth supporting. In fact it is the duty of racial nationalists to take a leading role in such protests, even if they are organised by conservative reactionaries with whom we have little else in common.

So the second question becomes, how does a particular street protest contribute to promoting our ideology and advancing our broader political project?

Turning again briefly to last Saturday’s shambles in London, we can easily see that (even setting aside the fundamentally fraudulent prospectus of ‘Tommy Robinson’ and his fellow Zionist propagandists) there was nothing to be gained for racial nationalists from participating in such an event.

There was no possibility of advancing racial nationalist ideas, and the entire charade was simply leading many otherwise sincere patriots down a political cul-de-sac.

In Madrid by contrast the situation calls for serious strategic planning as well as courage. It’s obvious that the leaders of the anti-Sánchez demonstrations are reactionaries – principally from the supposedly ‘right-wing’ Vox and the conservative Partido Popular. Therefore by participating, there is always a risk that racial nationalists are simply acting as footsoldiers for the benefit of our enemies.

For there can be no doubt that the reactionary ‘right-wing’ is our enemy. In some ways a more deadly enemy than the subversive ‘left’.

Tucker Carlson, the American broadcaster and leading international spokesman for the reactionary right, with Vox leader Santiago Abascal at last night’s Madrid protest. The task for racial nationalists is to separate ourselves from the Abascal-Carlson reactionary agenda, even while standing on the front line in broadly-based demonstrations.

But it’s a risk well worth taking. Not only because it is our duty to be on the front line when our nation is under attack (whether as British and Ulster patriots confronting the IRA and its sympathisers, or as Spanish patriots confronting their Basque or Catalan equivalents), but because by demonstrating our commitment – our fanatical devotion to race and nation – we can begin to awaken even those of our compatriots who previously had a limited ideological perspective.

Moreover the self-evident bankruptcy of Spain’s 1978 ‘democratic’ constitution now means that events are moving rapidly, and the potential for radicalisation is greater than anywhere else in Western Europe.

It is, however, essential for racial nationalists to achieve the delicate balance of both participating in a broadly-based protest, but also maintaining our distinct message.

This can best be achieved by:
(a) continuing a barrage of online propaganda focused on our core ideology, and relating it to the rapidly developing confrontation on the streets:
and (b) ensuring that our militants are displaying placards and banners that reflect our message, not the reactionary message.

This means, for example, that whether in Madrid, Paris or London we should never carry placards or post online propaganda that puts our case in religious rather than racial terms.

Of course at various points in our struggle we shall have allies who think primarily in religious terms – which means that in Madrid our allies will often be devout Catholics, whereas in Belfast or Glasgow our allies will often be militant Protestants.

But our fight against the undermining of Western civilization and the betrayal of our nations and our race is not a fight against Islam, any more than it is a fight for or against the Pope. It makes absolutely no difference to us whether a non-European immigrant is Muslim, Christian, Hindu, Buddhist, Zoroastrian or Marxist/Atheist. We resist the non-European invasion in the name of racial preservation and true European renaissance – not in the name of any God or Gods.

To adopt an Islam-obsessed agenda is the worst kind of surrender to reactionary politics. Whether or not in particular cases it also serves the Zionist agenda, it simply has no part in an ideologically coherent racial nationalist struggle.

It is only by maintaining a coherent ideological line that we can obtain any political advantage from these street confrontations. We should never forget that ours is a war of ideas, not a mere street skirmish for adolescents. The battles on the streets are a means to an end, not an end in themselves.

Which brings us to a final topic for today’s analysis. Having addressed strategy, what about tactics? What methods are justifiable in pursuit of our objectives?

The simple answer to that is that any and every method is justifiable, provided it is necessary and properly focused.

In mainland Britain all talk of political violence is (in all conceivable present circumstances) utterly counter-productive and should be rejected by serious racial nationalists, irrespective of moral and legal considerations. Whereas in Northern Ireland there have been times in the very recent past where violence was not only necessary, but was the duty of every decent patriot in the struggle against a vile and murderous foe – the IRA and its proxies and splinters.

In Madrid the treacherous and subversive actions of the Prime Minister have crossed the line at which resistance – even violent resistance – becomes not only an option but a duty.

So the central question for nationalists is not whether violence is philosophically justified, but at what point it becomes both necessary and practically achievable. That’s a decision that can only be taken on a day-to-day basis by those involved. But again the imperative for our movement’s leaders is to maintain a sense of the broader objective. The adrenalin of battle needs to be tempered by strategic focus. We are in politics to achieve a national revolution, not to obtain the short term satisfaction that can be gained either by electing a councillor or vandalising our enemies’ premises.

Isabel Peralta and a comrade from the new national socialist youth group Sección de Asalto salute the crowds last week outside the PSOE headquarters. With the traditional salute of the 1930s Falangists, Isabel and her comrades seek to radicalise these demonstrations and revive the best elements of the legacy of Ramiro Ledesma Ramos and the martyrs of 1936, not the reactionary legacy of the Franco regime.

And that national revolution will be achieved by consistent commitment and serious thinking, not by the mentality prevalent on the internet by which extravagant claims are made one day, only to be forgotten the next, in pursuit of the next ‘click-bait’, the next ‘likes’, the next ‘followers’.

The type of followers we need are people who will both read a book, and spend hours putting themselves on the line in a street confrontation. As my old comrade Jonathan Bowden put it, we need a return of Lord Byron’s ideal concept: the cultured thug.

Further articles on this site and in H&D will examine the ideology that will sustain and motivate these cultured thugs: the revolutionary praxis of the 2020s.

Scottish justice or “due deference” to French-Zionist lobby? The Reynouard case hangs in the balance [report now translated into four languages!]

On 21st September, a Scottish Crown prosecutor asked an Edinburgh court to show “due deference to France” and extradite a man who is accused of no crime under Scottish law. H&D’s assistant editor Peter Rushton reports from the court. This article and related material also appears at Peter’s Real History blog and now also in Spanish by clicking on this link. Also now available in German translation at this link and in French translation at Vincent’s own blog. And Vincent’s open letter to President Macron is now also available in German translation for the first time.

The revisionist historian Vincent Reynouard was appearing at Edinburgh Sheriff Court for a full hearing of his extradition case. This was almost exactly ten months after his arrest in the Scottish fishing village of Anstruther, where Vincent had been working quietly as a private tutor and completing his most important historical revisionist work concerning the so-called “massacre” at Oradour.

He was arrested in a raid by Scottish police, working with Scotland Yard detectives, at the request of French prosecutors who wish to jail him for revisionist videos concerning both Oradour and the alleged homicidal ‘gas chambers’ at Auschwitz.

None of these revisionist works contravenes Scottish or English law, but the UK authorities were heavily lobbied by the Jewish charity ‘Campaign Against Antisemitism’ and by the ultra-Zionist peer Lord Austin (formerly Ian Austin MP).

The sheer absurdity of this situation – the criminalisation of a scholar – was brought home to me by two incidents (one trivial, one serious) at the Edinburgh Court while waiting for Vincent’s case to be heard.

A sticker for the Edinburgh branch of the St Pauli supporters’ club was displayed in the lavatory at the Court. Supporters of St Pauli (a football club based in Hamburg) are notorious worldwide for their violent ‘anti-fascism’ and Marxism. It is impossible to imagine that a sticker promoting any violent ‘racist’ or ‘fascist’ group (from, for example, supporters of a club such as Lazio, Chelsea, Millwall or Oldham) would have been allowed to remain on display at a court!

The other incident was more serious. Vincent’s case was being heard in a courtroom that specialises in extradition, which of course meant that more than two hours were taken up (before Vincent’s case began) by a long procession of procedural, pre-trial discussions of a range of unconnected defendants, including alleged gangsters from Eastern Europe.

Terrorist and assassin Antoin Duffy appeared at the same extradition court a few minutes before Vincent – illustrating the absurdity by which revisionist scholars and advocates of national socialism (none of whose conduct is criminal in the UK) have been put on a par with some of the world’s most dangerous murderers.

By far the most serious of these procedural discussions involved a defendant appearing by video link. This was the notorious ‘Real IRA’ terrorist and assassin Antoin Duffy (aka Anton Duffy), who in 2015 was jailed for 17 years for conspiracy to murder two ex-UDA members (Johnny Adair and Sam ‘Skelly’ McCrory) exiled in Scotland after their expulsion from the UDA.

Duffy is still serving this sentence in a top-security Scottish jail, but he is also now wanted by police and prosecutors in the Irish Republic, to face charges of murdering Denis Donaldson, an MI5 agent inside the IRA, who was killed in 2006. This is why Duffy was appearing on the same day as Vincent, in the Edinburgh extradition court.

H&D cannot yet comment on the latest specific charges – but it is beyond dispute (based on earlier convictions and years of police and MI5 covert surveillance) that Duffy is one of the UK’s most dangerous terrorists. Extradition procedures are designed for those accused of actual crimes: yet this week in Edinburgh (and in fact for the past ten months) Vincent Reynouard – a scholar, not a criminal – has been subjected to these same procedures.

As we have also seen with persistent abuse of the Terrorism Act by the UK authorities, those who simply seek to tell the truth about European history are persecuted by UK authorities who choose to follow the instructions of shadowy international lobbyists rather than UK law.

Nevertheless, there are reasons to be optimistic about Vincent’s case. He was very ably represented by his solicitor Paul Dunne and advocate Fred Mackintosh KC (who also practices as a barrister in England). It should of course be emphasised that Vincent’s defence is (rightly and properly) based on legal arguments, not on his historical and political views per se. As in any other such case, it should not be inferred that either Mr Dunne or Mr Mackintosh is in any way sympathetic to Vincent’s opinions, or indeed that either of them have any views or expertise on historical or political matters. They are experts on extradition law, not on historical revisionism or national socialism.

Due to Vincent having already spent ten months in jail (for something that isn’t even a crime in the UK!) the initial French warrant has been discharged.

This initial warrant was based on his having already been convicted and sentenced (in his absence) by a Parisian court. But he is no longer extraditable on those grounds, because that sentence has (in effect) already been served in Scotland, while Vincent awaited this extradition hearing.

Having dealt with the discharge of the first warrant, Mr Mackintosh proceeded to address the second.

Since it involves new charges (rather than a prior conviction) the ‘ticklist’ of the old European Arrest Warrant (now operating in revised form post-Brexit) doesn’t apply. Mr Mackintosh therefore pointed out that the traditional extradition principle of “dual criminality” operates in this case.

In other words, the Edinburgh Court must be satisfied that the conduct of which Vincent is accused would potentially be criminal in Scotland as well as in France.

The judge should (Mr Mackintosh continued) draw inferences as to Vincent’s “intent”, by looking at his overall conduct, and by studying the entire transcripts of his videos, not merely accepting the prosecutors’ interpretation of certain phrases taken out of context.

He highlighted one video, on which the prosecutors had based a large part of their case, and emphasised that the judge should study the full translated transcript carefully. This was a video published on 22nd February 2020, whose title translates as “The Jewish Problem – what solution?”

Vincent’s counsel did not dispute that his videos contain what has been termed “Holocaust denial”, that some of them address the “Jewish problem”, and that one in particular “denies” the historicity of the “Oradour massacre”.

But Mr Mackintosh’s central argument as to why Vincent should not be extradited began with a judgment in 2015 by the European Court of Human Rights, in the case of Perinçek v. Switzerland.

The relevant aspect of this judgment (which involved a Turkish political activist accused of “denying” the Armenian genocide committed by the Ottoman Empire during the First World War), is that the European Court spelled out the very different laws among European states regarding “denial” of genocide.

Among those European countries that have signed up to the European Convention on Human Rights, the Court noted:
“there are now essentially four types of regimes in this domain, in terms of scope of the offence of genocide denial: (a) States, such as Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, the Netherlands and Romania, that only criminalise the denial of the Holocaust or more generally of Nazi crimes (Romania in addition criminalises the Nazi extermination of the Roma, and Greece criminalises, on top of the Holocaust and Nazi crimes, the denial of genocides recognised by an international court or its own Parliament); (b) States, such as the Czech Republic and Poland, that criminalise the denial of Nazi and communist crimes; (c) States, such as Andorra, Cyprus, Hungary, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Malta, Slovakia, Slovenia and Switzerland, that criminalise the denial of any genocide (Lithuania in addition specifically criminalises denial of Soviet and Nazi crimes vis-à-vis the Lithuanians, but Cyprus only criminalises the denial of genocides recognised as such by a competent court); and (d) States, such as Finland, Italy, Spain (following the 2007 judgment of its Constitutional Court cited in paragraph 96 above), the United Kingdom and the Scandinavian States, that do not have special provisions criminalising such conduct.”

The European Court was clear, Mr Mackintosh said, that the UK had not chosen to make any form of “Holocaust denial” a specific criminal offence.

He added that in Vincent Reynouard’s case, the prosecution therefore had to satisfy the Scottish court that Vincent’s conduct (as alleged in the extradition warrant) met the test either for a S.127 Communications Act offence, or a breach of the peace (a common law offence).

The question of what behaviour can constitute a “breach of the peace” under Scottish law has been revised several times during recent decades – and is a matter on which Mr Mackintosh has special expertise, having for example written an article for Scottish Legal News on this very topic.

Such conduct must be serious enough to “cause alarm to ordinary people”, and it must “threaten serious disturbance to the community”. The relevant judgment was delivered in 2014 by Lady Clark of Calton, and Mr Mackintosh said that Lady Clark had reminded the lower courts that “for conduct to be likely to cause a reasonable person to suffer fear or alarm there has to be something further than annoyance and distress”.

Mr Mackintosh explained that the test of whether conduct “threatens serious disturbance in the community” necessarily involves considering the full context. He quoted several cases in Scottish courts involving racial and sectarian abuse at football matches, where a crucial element was that this abuse had been directed at (or delivered in close proximity to) rival supporters, in the incendiary context of a football match attended by supporters of opposing teams.

In a 1981 case against communist activist Mike Duffield, the Sheriff Court had ruled that shouting pro-IRA slogans while selling the Marxist newspaper Fight Racism Fight Imperialism and the pro-IRA newspaper Hands off Ireland was a breach of the peace, despite this being carried out at the stadium of Glasgow Celtic, where many fans hold similar views.

And on the other side of politics, there had been a breach of the peace case involving a National Front activist selling the Young NF paper Bulldog outside the Hearts stadium in Edinburgh.

But in all these cases – and especially bearing in mind recent clarifications of the law in Scotland – it was essential to assess the wider context of the words used – in Vincent’s case, words used in videos broadcast online.

There were eight such videos referred to by French prosecutors in the present warrant. The first related specifically to Oradour. The second, third and fourth presented detailed arguments as to why (in Vincent’s considered opinion) there had been no homicidal ‘gas chambers’ at Auschwitz, explaining that conventional ‘Holocaust’ history is based on specious evidence. The fifth and sixth discussed the “Jewish problem” or “what to do about the Jews”. And the seventh and eighth returned to the topic of Auschwitz, the ‘gas chambers’, and broader ‘Holocaust’ themes.

Mr Mackintosh emphasised that in the case of six of these eight videos, Vincent Reynouard had not been calling for any form of action. None of the content potentially qualified as personal abuse, and none of it could be seen as “threatening”. The videos amounted to a historical critique – which might well be controversial, but not illegal in Scotland.

In the case of videos 5 and 6, Vincent was responding to a correspondent. The prosecution had chosen to isolate certain phrases out of context, but Mr Mackintosh said that once seen in context it was clear that Vincent was stating his opposition to any policy of “exterminating” the Jews.

The test that the court had to apply was not whether “reasonable people” would reject Vincent’s views, but whether these views threatened “serious disturbance to society”. Were the court to accept the prosecution’s argument, it would amount to ruling that discussion of controversial arguments regarding the ‘Holocaust’ had become a crime in the UK. Mr Mackintosh said it was open to Parliaments in London and Edinburgh to make ‘Holocaust denial’ a crime, but they had (so far) chosen not to do so.

Therefore to be criminal, Vincent’s words would have to cross a further line, a further evidential test, in order to be regarded as a “breach of the peace”.

Mr Mackintosh then turned to the alternative test, S.127 of the Communications Act. For Vincent’s videos to be considered criminal in this context, they would have to be not merely offensive, but “grossly offensive”.

Prosecutors had rested much of their argument on the precedent of the Chabloz case, as tried in the London courts during recent years – not a binding precedent, but, they argued, very much a “persuasive” precedent in this case. [Chabloz has in recent years been excluded from British revisionist circles, due to her treacherous and malicious conduct in betraying Robert Faurisson’s final meeting to the ‘anti-fascist’ publication ‘Hope not Hate’. But her earlier actions have, as we predicted at the time, served as a precedent to threaten the liberty of Vincent Reynouard.]

On appeal, Chabloz’s conduct had been found to go beyond satire, having crossed the legal line into deliberate, malicious abuse. By contrast, Mr Mackintosh argued, the judge in the present case would find (if he examined the full transcripts of Vincent’s videos) that his arguments – even when highly controversial – were delivered as a calm, academic analysis, not as crude anti-semitic abuse in the Chabloz style.

Mr Mackintosh referred to the leading S.127 case in relation to interpretation of what is “grossly offensive”, namely the Collins case, and the judgment of Lord Bingham.

This had made clear that what is “grossly offensive” has to be assessed in the context of the standards of an “open, just, multiracial society” – a contemporary context that is “reasonably enlightened, but not perfectionist”.

In other words, Mr Mackintosh emphasised, the words complained of had to cause gross offence, not simply “to people who care about the Holocaust” and who, for whatever reasons, hold different views to Vincent, but to broader society.

Were ‘Holocaust denial’ or disputing the historicity of Oradour to be deemed criminal per se, the question would necessarily arise – what about the Amritsar massacre, what about the Armenian genocide, and many other controversial historical subjects?

Mr Mackintosh concluded his argument by addressing the question of proportionality. An extradition court is required to consider whether the alleged offence is sufficiently severe to attract a custodial sentence. For example, recent instructions to the lower courts had emphasised that defendants should not be extradited for minor public order offences.

He noted that even in the Chabloz case – where the defendant had been convicted for gross offensiveness which was of a very different character to Vincent’s videos – this had not led to custodial sentences.

It would therefore, Mr Mackintosh argued, be both wrong in law and disproportionate for the Edinburgh Court to extradite Vincent Reynouard to France.

In his argument, the prosecutor (Advocate depute Paul Harvey) insisted that Vincent’s videos did pass the evidential test for the Court to regard his conduct as either (or both) a breach of the peace, and/or “grossly offensive” under S.127.

He invited the judge to consider Vincent’s words in one of the video transcripts, where he had stated that “there is a Jewish problem”, and that in his analysis of this problem he would “go further” than Adolf Hitler. “Naturally, the Jews exploit the situation: to dominate, even to subjugate us.”

Mr Harvey described these words as “the most appalling anti-semitism”, and asked the judge to view all of the videos complained of in the French warrant, in the light of this “anti-semitism”.

Questioned by the judge on this point, Mr Harvey said that (in the prosecutors’ submission) each video should be looked at as a separate breach of the peace offence, but should also be interpreted overall as a “course of conduct” by Vincent.

The mere fact that the UK had no special provision criminalising “Holocaust denial” did not in itself absolve the defendant. When expressed in the terms used by Vincent, Mr Harvey insisted that “Holocaust denial” could be interpreted as criminal under UK as well as French law.

Quoting the case of Rangers fan William Kilpatrick, who had posted on Facebook endorsing the sending of “bombs and bombs” to Celtic manager Neil Lennon, Mr Harvey argued that under Scottish law, intending or inciting a specific action was not necessarily relevant to whether certain words were a “breach of the peace”.

Mr Harvey maintained that some of Vincent’s words in the video could reasonably have led to his being charged with a breach of the peace under Scottish law, because they were calculated to provoke a disturbance of public order.

In fact, he argued that Vincent’s words were potentially a more serious crime than breach of the peace in a football stadium: because they could be viewed online at any time, anywhere in Scotland. Incitement to specific criminal action did not, the prosecution argued, have to be proven.

Mr Harvey added that Vincent’s “crimes” had to be looked at in the context of the very different cultural context in France, and the more serious risk of “anti-semitism being incited”. While the words Vincent used could, Mr Harvey argued, be prosecutable even in Scotland, the Court should take account of the fact that in a French context, they were even more serious.

Unsurprisingly, the prosecutor rejected the defence argument that Vincent’s words were calm, academic discourse. He said they were comparable to the Chabloz case, where it had been established that once a clearly anti-semitic motive had been established, espousal of “Holocaust denial” was ipso facto grossly offensive.

Mr Harvey accepted that (under UK law) not every instance of “Holocaust denial” was criminal, but he maintained that in the cases of both Chabloz and Vincent Reynouard, denying the “Holocaust” did amount to “gross offensiveness”, and therefore contravened S.127.

The prosecutor said the judge would need to apply the proportionality test very carefully. Unlike, for example, a drugs or theft case, Vincent’s criminal conduct was highly context-specific, where the appropriate sentence might differ enormously between Scotland and France. The judge should therefore “respect and give due weight” to French circumstances involving their history, and even present day “racial relations”, which meant that a French court “is justified in taking a severe approach to this”.

Given Vincent’s long and repeated record of “criminal conduct”, Mr Harvey concluded that a custodial sentence in France was not only possible but highly likely: “I urge you to show due deference to France and their different traditions.”

In a brief reply concluding the hearing, Vincent’s counsel Fred Mackintosh said that if the judge accepted the prosecution’s argument, it would amount to saying that any “racist” statement on Facebook or YouTube, regardless of context, would be a breach of the peace. He urged the judge to reject this argument and to recognise that “Holocaust denial” when expressed in Vincent’s terms, is not a crime in Scotland – neither a breach of the peace, nor grossly offensive.

The judge said that he aimed to have read all relevant material and considered the arguments fully, in time to pass judgment on 12th October.

Clearly, the Vincent Reynouard case has become a vitally important test of whether historical revisionism will be criminalised in the UK via a ‘back door’ route, without any honest and open discussion in Parliament.

We shall make a further assessment of the broader context soon. But it should be recognised by all concerned that there will be no surrender of the basic principles involved. In the UK, Spain and Canada, European traditions of free historical inquiry are under attack. We shall defend those traditions, by any and every method that proves necessary.

[UPDATE: On 12th October the Edinburgh judge Sheriff Dickson ruled that Vincent should be extradited to France. For a report on this extraordinary judgement, click here. Vincent remains in Edinburgh Prison, pending an appeal in January 2024.]

Mossad’s investment in the Le Pen dynasty finally paying off?

Roger Auque, Mossad agent and father of Marion Maréchal

Last week Marine Le Pen and Jordan Bardella (the president of her Rassemblement National party) gave unequivocal support to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Le Pen’s niece Marion Maréchal, who next year will lead the European parliamentary election slate of a rival nationalist party Reconquête!) is an even more staunch and longstanding Zionist, saying that “France must stand unambiguously alongside Israel in this new ordeal.”

Marion Maréchal as a guest at the Conservative Political Action Conference in National Harbor, Maryland, in 2018

Perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised, since Marion Maréchal’s real father Roger Auque was an agent of the Israeli intelligence service Mossad.

In a new article at the Real History blog, H&D‘s Peter Rushton examines the strange connections between the Le Pen dynasty and Mossad.

Vincent Reynouard reports from his Edinburgh jail on the eve of his extradition trial

Scottish justice will soon decide whether to extradite me to France or release me. Knowing that, if I am extradited, I will probably spend years in prison, we can say that my fate will be decided on September 21st.

My lawyers are optimistic. Indeed, having served the entire prison sentence which earned me the first arrest warrant, only the second remains. Paris is asking me to judge me for several videos. However, to be extradited, these videos must constitute crimes in both France and Scotland. My lawyers’ argument is clear: my comments do not transgress UK laws.

My opponents invoke the precedent set by the conviction of singer A. Chabloz in 2018. However, A. Chabloz was convicted for having composed, performed and broadcast “grossly offensive” songs. In question here were the vocabulary chosen, the tone adopted and the criticisms formulated against the Jewish people in general. My videos are totally different. Although they may shock and offend, they are never grossly offensive and, therefore, remain within the bounds of freedom of expression as conceived in the United Kingdom.

Many of my relatives are therefore optimistic about the outcome of this hearing. For my part, I am neither pessimistic nor optimistic, because I have learned not to hope for anything and not to fear anything. The reason is always the same: I trust in Providence. So far, she has protected me in my mission. I am therefore convinced that the decision of September 21 will be the most likely to serve the revisionist cause. Certainly, for me, it will undoubtedly be the occasion for new trials, but the trials are there so that we improve by overcoming them.

I will therefore accept the final truth, whatever it may be, and will continue to place the revisionist cause above my personal destiny, because revisionism serves the Common Good and, as a National Socialist, I have always advocated the primacy of the common good over particular interests. Therefore, I will not back down now. My personal destiny is of no importance.

Some will call me a fanatic. However, when we see how the anti-revisionists treat us, we understand that only diehards can endure the fight on the front line. If I wasn’t one, I would have given up a long time ago. Providence raises up the right people where they are needed. Our adversaries being fanatics, She opposes fanatics to them. It’s in the natural order of things.

So I calmly wait for September 21st. In the calm of my cell, I continue my activities of reading, writing, meditation and drawing. After ten months, a daily routine was established. I hardly notice that I am in prison anymore. I’m like on a ship where life unfolds peacefully. For the past few weeks, I have been the oldest on my wing. I know the staff and the inmates know me, because I am a somewhat unusual prisoner.

I should have been released on August 10th, once my prison sentence was fully served. However, the Scottish justice system decided to keep me in prison on the grounds that I could take advantage of my release to escape again. Knowing what I have done since October 2021, this fear is understandable. I would add that, even if this extension of my detention were illegal, I would not claim any compensation, because I did not suffer – far from it – in Edinburgh prison.

Besides, in Edinburgh prison, the deprivation of liberty as it affects me is entirely relative. Certainly, my body is held in a penitentiary establishment, but my mind remains free. Here, I read a lot: I discovered authors like Denis Marquet (on spirituality) and Jacques Ellul (on technique). I corresponded freely with wonderful people. I was able to exercise every day, including three times a week in a well-equipped gym. I enjoyed an excellent diet that many people would envy. Finally, I improved my drawing techniques, especially watercolour.

In my eyes, I am much freer than the citizen forced to get up every morning to do an uninteresting job. My freedom is a thousand times greater than that of people without an inner life, glued to their screen and slaves to social networks.

As for the prison guards, they were very kind to me, probably because they think that there is no legitimate reason for me to be in prison. Not long ago, in fact, a guard told me: “You have been in prison for almost a year, because France does not respect the right to freedom of expression!” I think she was expressing the thoughts of the guards in general…

It is true that, from this vantage point in Scotland, we observe, incredulously, the climate of hysteria which reigns in France around real or imagined anti-Semitism. The causes of this frenzy are undoubtedly multiple.

Revisionist pioneer Robert Faurisson addressing his final conference in Shepperton, England, attended by Vincent Reynouard and organised by H&D’s Peter Rushton

First of all, I think a lot of Jews are worried. In this changing and crisis-ridden world, they fear a new persecution, even a new “Holocaust”, on the grounds that they would always have been the scapegoats. The associations which represent them therefore act to eradicate anti-Judaism from society. However, knowing that, in our part of the world, “racism” has become the capital sin, the government – whoever it may be – is obliged to support this action.

To this is probably added another fact: at a time when the Rassemblement National (RN – National Rally) is considered, rightly or wrongly, as a force capable of influencing politics, attacking the ultra-right induces Marine Le Pen increasingly to dissociate herself from the ideals of the national right. And as we always end up becoming what we say, whether by conviction or by strategy, then the more the government attacks the ultra-right, the more the RN becomes normalised .

Finally, I think that for some, hitting the ultra-right is another way of attacking the RN, with a view to preventing a possible electoral victory for Marine Le Pen. Indeed, when a government has no positive record to its credit, its only political strategy consists of presenting itself as the ultimate bulwark against the foul Beast. He can then say: “See, the foul beast is not dead. Don’t be fooled; the de-demonisation of the RN is only apparent. If Marine Le Pen comes to power or even comes close, the ultra-right will take the opportunity to resurface.” In my eyes therefore, these various causes contribute to the ambient hysteria.

As for me, I represent an intellectual danger for the government, because I demonstrate that the crimes attributed to the Foul Beast are propaganda lies. My action appears all the more dangerous to him because I denounced a particularly fragile myth: the alleged massacre of women and children in the church of Oradour by the ‘barbaric’ Waffen SS. Without denying the deaths of these people, I demonstrate that the circumstances of this tragedy were very different.

However, if the myth of Oradour falls, some might wonder about Auschwitz. The link will be all the more natural since, since 2017, the challenge to the official History of Oradour has also been repressed by the anti-revisionist law. People will then say: “The myth of Oradour was protected by the same law which prohibits contesting the existence of the gas chambers of Auschwitz; therefore, are these gas chambers also a myth?”

The guardians of Memory cannot therefore retreat: they must defend tooth and nail the myth of Oradour. Hence their interest in silencing me. This doesn’t bode well for me. However, here again, my personal destiny is unimportant. I don’t expect anything down here. The reward will come after this earthly life. This is my conviction (which I do not impose on anyone). Therefore, I am calm.

H&D will report further on Vincent Reynouard’s case and additional reports will appear in English at the Real History blog and in French at Vincent’s own blog Sans Concession.

Dominique Venner – a hero of the True Europe

Ten years ago – on 21st May 2013 – a great French racial nationalist, Dominique Venner, committed suicide in dramatic circumstances at the Cathedral of Notre Dame.

Venner’s father had been part of Jacques Doriot’s pre-war nationalist party. He was himself politically active from the mid-1950s until his death, as one of the leading figures in an intellectual movement known as the Nouvelle Droite, together with Alain de Benoist, Pierre Krebs, and the late Guillaume Faye. The ND’s leaders later came to disagree with each other on some fundamental issues, but for the past sixty years their work has been among the highest quality contributions to European resistance.

Usually, racial nationalists should disapprove of pessimism, and especially suicide, since our racial nationalist ideology is a celebration of life and optimism.

Of course, some leading European nationalists have killed themselves in exceptional situations, but in today’s world we should not usually accept that suicide is a positive political option.

But Venner was 78 and very seriously ill. He wanted to make a final political gesture while he was able to do so.

Dominique Venner died as he had lived – as a hero of the True Europe.

Paris march remembers Sebastien Deyzieu

On Saturday French patriots from a cross-party coalition held a march in central Paris to remember their comrade Sebastien Deyzieu, who died during a demonstration in 1994.

Deyzieu was part of a demonstration that sought to highlight disastrous consequences of the Allied invasion of Europe and the post-1945 political settlement – Soviet Russian domination of Eastern Europe and American global capitalist domination of Western Europe.

Parisian authorities banned this May 1994 event, organised by the nationalist student group Groupe Union Défense (GUD), and Deyzieu was killed during an ensuing confrontation with police.

Every year since then, GUD has been part of a cross-party ‘9th May Committee’ that organises a memorial event.

This year the French left and Zionist groups have reacted with predictably hysterical demands that the march should have been banned.

President Macron and his government are among the most fearful and unpopular of Europe’s rulers. Yesterday all counter-demonstrations were banned as Macron attended events to commemorate the “victory” over National Socialist Germany on May 8th 1945. Macron also travelled to Lyon yesterday to pay tribute to the “Resistance hero” Jean Moulin, who was arrested by the Gestapo in 1943 and died during interrogation.

Rival biographies in recent decades have suggested either that Moulin was himself a Kremlin agent, or that he was betrayed by communist rivals within the “Resistance”.

Perhaps that historical debate over Moulin will never be resolved. But what we do know is that the “victory” of 1945 inaugurated decades of tyranny, from which Europe is only now beginning to emerge. Sebastien Deyzieu is a hero of the True Europe whose spirit has survived that postwar tyranny.

H&D joins patriots across Europe in saluting his memory.

French nationalists forge ahead: Macron’s project in crisis

‘Centrist’ French President Emmanuel Macron – the ultimate Rothschild / Goldman Sachs politician – was lionised by international liberal journalists when he defeated nationalist candidate Marine Le Pen in 2017 (and to a lesser extent when he won re-election last year).

But the wheels have now come off Macron’s globalist project, and French nationalists once again seem poised for power.

The immediate crisis is due to Macron’s proposals to raise the pension age, as part of a package of reforms designed to shift social and economic policies away from the traditional French ‘big state’ towards a more Anglo-American, privatised, ‘business friendly’ model. Having failed to win a majority at last year’s parliamentary elections, Macron has opted to bypass the National Assembly and impose his new policy by presidential decree. This approach – reminiscent of the most chaotic years of Germany’s Weimar Republic – has understandably inflamed violent street protests.

The Le Pen dynasty whose family drama has dominated French nationalism for decades. (above left to right) Jean-Marie Le Pen, founder of the Front National, now 94 years old and hospitalised after a heart attack last weekend; his granddaughter Marion Maréchal, now associated with the dissident nationalist party Reconquête; and his daughter Marine Le Pen, leader of the rebranded FN now known as Rassemblement National.

Both the traditional left and Marine Le Pen’s Rassemblement National have strongly resisted these moves and present themselves as champions of French workers. Le Pen has for more than a decade succeeded in realigning her party (founded as the Front National by her father Jean-Marie Le Pen) towards what some would regard as more ‘left-wing’ economic policies.

Meanwhile Le Pen’s rival Éric Zemmour is pitching for a very different vote. His party Reconquête is more hardline on racial questions and less squeamish than Le Pen on issues related to French history, such as the legacy of Marshal Philippe Pétain’s wartime government at Vichy. Perhaps because Zemmour is Jewish, he has an ‘alibi’ that allows him to be relatively frank about Second World War history and more tolerant of semi-revisionist positions, from which Le Pen (unlike her father) is desperate to dissociate herself.

More directly relevant to most French voters, however, is Zemmour’s far more conservative stance on economic questions, where Reconquête is much closer to the Anglo-American mainstream right and pitches for middle-class voters, competing with the declining French conservative party (now rebranded as ‘Republicans’). Zemmour’s allies present his party as the only real voice of the ‘right’ in French politics.

In the most recent opinion polls, Zemmour is backed by 6-7% of the electorate (about the same as his 7.1% at last April’s presidential election), while Le Pen would lead a hypothetical first round with 30-33%, a significant advance on her 23.2% last year. Le Pen is well ahead of Macron’s likely successors as ‘centrist’ candidate, who would take 23-24% in the first round and compete with the far-left for the privilege of facing Le Pen in a second round run-off. (Macron himself is constitutionally barred from standing for a third term.)

In a legislative election, Le Pen’s RN would compete with the far-left, polling roughly 26% each, ahead of the President’s party on 22%. An alliance of the Republicans and other conservative parties is presently polling only 10-11%; while Reconquête polls slightly under 5%, as do dissident elements of the once-mighty Socialist Party who refuse to ally with the far-left. This is an obvious recipe for continued stalemate in the National Assembly, even if another ‘centrist’ President succeeded Macron.

Le Pen’s rival Éric Zemmour

Zemmour will turn 65 in August, and would be almost 69 at the next scheduled presidential election in 2027. The main far-left leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon is seven years older than Zemmour, and even Marine Le Pen (a decade younger than Zemmour) is seen by some French nationalists as only having one more credible shot at the presidency.

Given the strange dynastic pattern of French nationalism, the future of the movement might still belong to Marine’s niece Marion Maréchal, who is allied to Zemmour. To be a credible leader and future presidential candidate, Maréchal will have to transcend bitter rivalries (including a personal split with her aunt); bridge the gap between the RN’s economic interventionism and Reconquête’s pro-capitalist stance; continue to present racially conscious nationalism as serious and electable; and escape the taint of Putinism that caused serious damage to Zemmour’s campaign last year.

This might seem a tough proposition, but the crises and contradictions facing ‘centrist’, liberal and leftist strands in French politics are even more intractable.

Despite many obvious obstacles, the future of French politics belongs to nationalism. Jean-Marie Le Pen changed European politics when he built the Front National into a serious electoral force during the 1980s: in their different ways, his daughter and granddaughter have a genuine chance of entering the Elysée Palace as President of France.

Strong third-place for Marine Le Pen’s party in French by-election

Jean-Marc Garnier again finished a close third as RN candidate in the traditionally left-wing Ariège constituency.

Marine Le Pen’s Rassemblement National did well in Sunday’s by-election for one of the two seats in the National Assembly allocated to the department de l’Ariège, which is a very beautiful but rather poor and traditionally left-wing area of southern France, famous in history as the centre of the Cathar or Albigensian heresy.

The by-election was caused by irregularities in the conduct of the general election in this constituency.  The far-left candidate Bénédicte Taurine was elected at last year’s general election but has been forced to recontest the seat after the poll was quashed by the Constitutional Court. Ms Taurine represents a broad alliance of ultra-left groups which calls itself La France Insoumise (‘France Unbowed’), a title which reflects the oddly patriotic stance of French socialists who argue that economic liberalism (promoted by President Emmanuel Macron) is a betrayal of French traditions.

The RN’s vote went up by a quarter from 20% to 25% but that was not quite good enough to take RN candidate Jean-Marc Garnier into next Sunday’s second round, where the far-left’s Ms Taurine (whose first round vote slipped slightly from 33.1% to 31.2%) will run-off against a Socialist Party dissident, Martine Froger (whose vote rose from 20.0% to 26.4%, no doubt partly thanks to having her party’s name on the ballot paper this time).

François-Xavier Jossinet and the Reconquête party presented themselves as “the real Right”.

The strange situation is that last year the Le Pen candidate only missed out on the run-off by eight votes, but in this week’s by-election they were 155 votes short despite a substantial increase in their own backing. Rival nationalist party Reconquête (led by Éric Zemmour) polled 2.8% (down from 3.3% last year), but while in theory this means that a combined nationalist vote would have taken second rather than third place, no-one can be sure that the RN could have relied on Reconquête voters’ backing.

Reconquête continues to be an annoyance to Marine Le Pen. It would however be simplistic to think that the two parties’ electorates are simply interchangeable. It is noteworthy that MLP’s niece Marion Maréchal (whose credibility has been badly damaged by Reconquête‘s electoral failure, but who is still seen as the eventual successor to Zemmour and perhaps as the eventual leader of French nationalism) has severely criticised the RN for not taking steps against a RN deputy who opened a mega-mosque in his constituency funded by the Turkish government. (Le Pen did eventually condemn the deputy concerned for this ‘personal initiative’.)

At the same time Maréchal and Zemmour have more or less endorsed President Macron’s view that raising the retirement age is inevitable given the burden of pension payments on the public purse.

So, rather in contrast to the way things have usually been in the UK’s nationalist movement (broad and narrow), the French movement’s middle class supporters take a harder line on race than its working class base (as well as forming a much larger proportion of the movement’s electoral base than they do here).

Macron’s candidate polled only 10.7% (down from 20.0% last year, reflecting the challenge to the president’s authority during the pensions crisis), and as in last year’s election there was no ‘centre-right’ candidate.

The split in the nationalist vote was unfortunate, but hatred between the Socialists and the far-left will be much increased by the bitter run-off on April 2nd, regardless of who wins!

Disillusionment with the entire French political system no doubt contributed to a very low turnout of only 39.6% in the by-election’s first round, down from 56.4% last year, despite a very wide range of candidates to choose from, comprising two rival nationalists, a Trotskyist who polled 2%, plus a local independent with 2.2%, and a Macronist, as well as the two rival left-wingers who will contest the run-off.

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