The LFI list for the European elections - led by Manon Aubry - was revealed this Wednesday.
Surprise: in seventh position is pro-Palestinian activist Rima Hassan.
A 31-year-old lawyer who grew up in a camp in Syria, before joining France, and who will take her first steps in politics.
“I fully appreciate the responsibility of this political commitment and of what is expected of each of us, collectively and individually,” she reacted very soberly on X (ex-Twitter) shortly after the announcement.
Before saying she was “honored to be able to carry out my commitments with rebellious France on both the Palestinian question and that of migration.
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🇪🇺 ✨ I fully appreciate the responsibility of this political commitment and of what is expected of each of us, collectively and individually.
We are embarking on a beautiful and promising European campaign, bringing hope and justice for so many struggles:… pic.twitter.com/Z0jrUTNt0G
— Rima Hassan (@RimaHas) March 6, 2024
On social networks, the positions on the Israeli-Palestinian question of the woman who founded the Observatory of Refugee Camps (OCR) in 2019 were quick to provoke a reaction from the political class.
“To obtain communitarian votes, Manon Aubry is ready to bring supporters of terrorism into the European Parliament,” launched the head of the National Rally list, Jordan Bardella.
“Rima Hassan called for the destruction of Israel, asks European countries to take back the Jews, opposes the two-state solution,” for his part attacked the spokesperson for the Renaissance deputies, Benjamin Haddad.
“Hamas is taking legitimate action”
In question, an interview given to the media Le Crayon in November in which she responded “true” to the statement “Hamas is taking legitimate action”, or pro-Palestinian messages posted on social networks.
“What Israel is doing to the Palestinians allows us to see a little more clearly every day regarding the genocidal nature of the Israeli regime,” she wrote on her X account this Tuesday evening.
LFI coordinator Manuel Bompard came to his defense, saying he did not believe “that he is a divisive personality”.
She is accused of having supported Hamas?
“We do too, that’s not why it’s true,” he replied.
Defending the Palestinian cause is one thing, supporting Hamas is another.
Activist Rima Hassan looks like a progressive, talks like a progressive but follows the agenda of Hamas fundamentalists and justifies the October 7 abuses.
Forbes would be honored by this… pic.twitter.com/aOEIyy14RL
— Yonathan Arfi (@Yonathan_Arfi) January 29, 2024
But who is Rima Hassan?
She was born in a camp in the suburbs of Aleppo (Syria) in 1992. She arrived in France at the age of 10 in Niort (Deux-Sèvres).
“I didn’t speak a word of French.
It happened that students called me stupid
,”
she told Le Parisien in May 2022.
After high school, she embarked on higher studies, at university then a master's degree in international law at La Sorbonne.
She then continued with two years of thesis on the law applicable in the camps, which she did not complete to create the OCR.
Read alsoRima Hassan, at the origin of the Refugee Camp Observatory, wants to be the voice of the “undesirables”
In August 2023, Forbes magazine
the class among the forty “exceptional” French women who marked the year and made France shine internationally.
At that time, Rima Hassan also advised the L'Oréal group "on the issues of professional integration of refugees in all the countries where the group is established", details Forbes.
A collaboration which will be suspended on November 8 by L'Oréal, as reported by Times of Israel.
“It’s a suspension agreement because I decided to prioritize my public speaking on the subject
(the Palestinian cause)
,” Rima Hassan responded last January.
David Guiraud, Arthur…
His name has recently come back to the forefront of the news several times.
Last November, she was present at a conference in Tunis (Tunisia), alongside LFI deputy David Guiraud and activist journalist Taha Bouhafs.
“The baby in the oven was indeed made by Israel,” David Guiraud declared at that time, sparking controversy.
Also read: Rima Hassan, described as anti-Semitic by Arthur, will file a complaint for defamation
More recently, Rima Hassan was in the sights of host Arthur.
“If you want to be in the next Forbes France ranking, the easiest way is to advocate Hamas terrorism and be a patent anti-Semite,” he wrote.
She responded by describing Arthur's position as "quite pathetic", before announcing that she was filing a complaint against him for defamation.
But faced with the controversy, Forbes decided, last February, to suspend its “40 women of the year” ceremony, because of the presence of this figure of the Palestinian cause.