Far-left Antifa militants physically attacked a group of Roman Catholic believers commemorating the martyrdom of Catholics by leftist extremists during the Paris commune in 1871, leaving one man hospitalised.
On Saturday a group of around three hundred Catholics gathered to honour those shot and killed by the revolutionary socialists who murdered 49 “hostages” in 1871 during the Paris commune, including ten clergymen.
The procession, which marched from the site of the execution of Georges Darboy, Archbishop of Paris, to the Notre-Dame des Otages church where many other killings took place, was met with immediate aggression, according to a report from Le Figaro.
Monsignor Denis Jachiet, Auxiliary Bishop of Paris, who organised the march, said it was composed of people of all ages, including small children.
Despite this, the procession was met by a group of far-left extremists waving red flags and chanting slogans such as, “Everyone hates the people of Versailles! Death to the fascists!”
“We would have thought we were back 150 years ago. It’s surreal,” Monsignor Jachiet said and said a group of around twenty masked and hooded youths approached the procession.
“They clearly wanted to fight it out. They were Antifa,” Jachiet said and added, “They snatched the banners from our hands, knocked down the French remembrance flag, which they trampled on, punched the parishioners. They threw garbage cans, bottles, even wire fences at us.”
Two Catholics in their 60s were said to have been injured during the attack by the far-left extremists. One of the victims was seriously injured in the head and had to be rushed to a local hospital.
Due to a lack of security and police presence, the Catholics were forced to take refuge in a local church where they are said to have prayed until police reinforcements arrived. According to one parishioner, the security was light as there had been few issues in prior processions.
French Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin reacted to the attack on Twitter on Sunday, stating, “Yesterday, in Paris, Catholics were attacked by violent individuals on the sidelines of a procession. The freedom of worship must be able to be exercised in all serenity in our country. Thoughts for the Catholics of France.”
The attack on French Catholics by Antifa militants comes just a month after Antifa members in the United States attacked a church in the city of Portland, Oregon.
Anti-Christian violence, including attacks on Catholic churches and cemeteries, in France has been a trend during the presidency of Emmanuel Macron to the point where a 2019 report noted that the country saw an average of three church attacks every day.
Ellen Fantini, director of the Vienna-based Observatory on Intolerance and Discrimination Against Christians in Europe (OIDACE), stated last year that between 2008 and 2019, the number of anti-Christian incidents in France had increased by 285 per cent.
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