Six people arrested for displaying a Palestinian flag on the Eiffel Tower are being prosecuted for trespassing

Six people arrested on Friday for displaying a Palestinian flag on the first floor of the Eiffel Tower are being prosecuted for "trespassing in a historic site," an offense punishable by a fine, the Paris public prosecutor's office told AFP on Monday.

"No danger having been characterized, only the offense of trespassing in a historic or cultural site has been retained against them, by penal order," the public prosecutor's office specified. This corresponds, according to the prosecutor's office, to a "5th class contravention," meaning a fine of up to 1,500 euros, a sum that can be increased to 3,000 euros in case of recidivism, according to the texts.

"The prosecutor's office is now determined to prosecute these activists for simple contraventions, mobilizing the repressive apparatus against engaged citizens while those responsible for the genocide remain, themselves, spared," denounced their lawyer Me Mohamed Jaite to AFP. The lawyer also deplored that the public prosecutor's office had "chosen to keep these activists in police custody, in undignified conditions, then to extend this measure without real procedural necessity, which resembles more a disguised punishment."

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Support from Rima Hassan

Shortly before 5 p.m. on Friday, police were called to reports of people displaying a four-by-three-meter Palestinian flag on the iconic monument of the capital, after having climbed onto the roof of the "Madame" restaurant on the 1st floor of the tower.

"There can be no ecological struggle if we, humanity, are not capable of fighting against the abomination of the ongoing massacres in Gaza," claimed Extinction Rebellion, a militant organization that fights against global warming, among other things, on X.

MEP Rima Hassan had expressed her support on X. "Hidalgo (the former mayor of Paris, editor's note) did not have GAV (police custody, editor's note) for having lit up the Eiffel Tower in the colors of the Israeli flag," she wrote. On October 9, 2023, the Iron Lady had lit up in the colors of the Israeli flag, in tribute to the victims of the unprecedented attack by the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas in Israel two days earlier, on October 7.