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Tuesday
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Magazine Subscribers only Tracking down the pianos taken from French Jews during the Nazi Occupation
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Lifestyle Inside Chanel's French leather workshops
Culture Subscribers only The marvelous bronzes of Angkor on display at the Musée Guimet in Paris
Monet and Renior were stolen from the Musée de Bagnols-sur-Cèze in 1972 and have never reappeared
with the judicial investigation yielding nothing
By Philippe Dagen
Articles from "Midi Libre" at the time of the art theft
MICHEL ABERLEN PRIVATE COLLECTION The list of artists reflects the scale of the theft: Pierre Bonnard
Pierre-Auguste Renoir and Édouard Vuillard
Sometime in the night between November 12 and 13
15 paintings by Impressionist painters were stolen from a museum on the second floor of the Bagnols-sur-Cèze town hall
The small-town theft took place without setting off an alarm
these paintings are still listed in Interpol's inventory of stolen works of art
carried out by the Montpellier Regional Judicial Police Service
not many people still think about this burglary
The thieves arrived through the roofs of the neighboring properties
which were empty at night because they housed a tax office and a school
they pierced the Impressionist room's ceiling and unrolled a rope ladder
After removing the frames and rolling up the paintings from the André Collection
they tried to enter the Besson Rooms but were unable to do so
They left with their precious loot without any trouble
The theft was not discovered until 2 pm the next day
when the museum's only janitor came to open it
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on 09 August 2018 dumped over 100 mm of rain in 1 hour
One man has been reported missing in the floods
France’s Ministry of Interior said the storm caused a sudden flood of tributaries of the Rhône and Ardèche rivers
Gard and Drôme departments were all affected
the Ministry said that a team of 400 Gendarmerie
Some houses on the banks of the Cèze river in Goudargues were also evacuated
The evacuated campers included 119 children from a campsite in Saint-Julien-de-Peyrolas
Four of the children were transported to a hospital in Bagnols sur Cèze and treated for hypothermia
A man who was helping supervise the children’s summer camp is still missing
Meteo France had warned of heavy rainfall in the region for 09 August
240 mm of rain had fallen in Saint-Martin-d’Ardèche
with 105 mm of that total falling in just 1 hour
Méjannes-le-Clap recorded 167 mm and Bessèges
— Préfet du Gard (@Prefet30) August 9, 2018
— Alexandre PISSAS (@APissas) August 10, 2018
Dans les prochaines heures, des #orages violents se déplacent entre l'Auvergne et le Nord-Est, accompagnés de grêle, rafales de vent de 80 à 120km/h. L'épisode méditerranéen va se décaler sur la région PACA dans l'après-midi ▶️https://t.co/KA0Ij27Eea pic.twitter.com/y6W8EET3ut
— VigiMétéoFrance (@VigiMeteoFrance) August 9, 2018
— Loïc Spadafora (@loicspadafora) August 9, 2018
— Keraunos (@KeraunosObs) August 9, 2018
Breaking NewsFrance
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By DAVID JONES
The swoop was made with ruthless speed and stealth
It came just as the Muslim preacher was settling down to read his newspaper after enjoying a family lunch
Shuffling to the front door to see who was banging so loudly
Imam Mahjoub Mahjoubi found himself confronted by 15 plain-clothes police officers
They had emerged from a convoy of cars and descended without warning on his home in Bagnols-sur-Ceze
13th-century town near Avignon where British tourists often stop off en route to the French Riviera
After marching inside they ordered the imam (who had lived in France for all but 12 of his 52 years
never troubling to apply for citizenship) to hand over his Tunisian passport
Then they thrust an official-looking document before him and told him to sign it
Mahjoub Mahjoubi was sent back to Tunisia for insulting the French flag in a sermon
who runs a building firm and gives popular Friday sermons at his local mosque
claims they did not explain the small print contained in this form
But after he had put his name to it they arrested him, giving him a few moments to collect his belongings before they took him away, ignoring the tearful entreaties of his wife, Almira, and their weeping children, the youngest of whom, a seven-year-old boy, is being treated for cancer
after he had been flown to Paris and processed at a police station
that he realised he had signed a governmental order bringing an abrupt end to his four decades of residency in France
Issued by Minister of the Interior Gerald Darmanin — the equivalent of our Home Secretary — under powers bestowed by a tough new Immigration Act which came into force last month
it authorised the imam’s immediate expulsion from his adopted country
And at 8.30pm, on Thursday, February 22 — just eight hours after that first knock on the door — he was bundled under guard onto an Air France plane bound for Tunis
scholarly-looking man done to warrant being exiled with guillotine-like swiftness and finality
small word,’ he repeated time and again this week
when I posed him that question at his temporary refuge — his in-laws’ house in Soliman
‘For speaking one word my entire world has been destroyed
They have separated me from my wife and children
thrown me out of the country I have lived in for 40 years
The small word to which he referred is ‘Tricolore’ (or tricolour in English) the name
Mahjoubi described this unassailable banner — an emblem of Republican democracy since the French Revolution — in terms that would shock and offend many proud Gauls
Addressing 500 male congregants crammed into a nondescript breeze-block mosque in Bagnols-sur-Ceze (and 12,000 more Facebook followers who watch his weekly sermons
delivered in Arabic and French) he insulted the flag as a devilish symbol that causes division among Muslims
and then ‘we will no longer have these Tricolore flags that gangrene us
the only value they have is a Satanic value
Imam Mahjoubi now insists that his use of the word ‘Tricolore’ was an unfortunate ‘slip of the tongue’
made when his impassioned sermon was in full flow
the African Cup of Nations football tournament was being played in Ivory Coast
and — as a big soccer fan — he had intended to decry the various national flags being brandished confrontationally by rival supporters whose shared Muslim religion ought to have united them
He certainly seemed contrite when we met, presenting himself as a paragon of tolerance who had spoken out against Islamist atrocities such as the Charlie Hebdo and Bataclan attacks in Paris in 2015
Yet it stretches the bounds of credulity to accept that this educated imam
who had lived in France since he was 12 and must have been well aware of its deep cultural attachment to the flag
his protestations of innocence have failed to convince prominent French Muslims who watched videos of the speech
also said to have included passages likely to heighten tensions with the Jewish community
the Rector of the Grand Mosque in Paris ‘strongly condemned’ the 40-minute address
saying it ran ‘counter to the principles of peaceful co-existence and mutual respect’ and ‘the values advocated by Islam’
Mahjoubi said: ‘For speaking one word my entire world has been destroyed
The imam’s outburst also shocked Bagnols-sur-Ceze’s mayor
‘This is a man I have known for ten years,’ he said
We can only guess how Imam Mahjoubi’s words were interpreted by his audience that Friday
With anger among already disaffected sections of the French Muslim community heightened by events in Gaza
surely he would have been well advised to avoid saying anything remotely sensitive
let alone cause young people to question their national allegiance and view Jews with enmity
For these are dark and dangerous times in France
It has become a country where a well-meaning teacher could be beheaded simply for showing a cartoon of the Prophet Muhammad during a lesson in about freedom of expression in 2020
high-rise banlieues to which millions of French North Africans are consigned simmers perilously — not only over Palestine but societal inequality and flashpoints such as the fatal shooting last summer of a 17-year-old by police
who had pulled over his car in the Paris suburbs
where the avowedly centrist Macron administration is being forced ever further to the Right to retain its popularity among alarmed white voters who increasingly believe the only answer to France’s multicultural woes lies in the hard-line policies of the National Rally (RN)
Founded as the National Front by Jean-Marie Le Pen
whose extremism once rendered him unelectable
the party was renamed by Le Pen’s daughter Marine in 2018
the RN has now become undeniably mainstream
Obliged to flex its muscles in the face of this existential threat
the government has launched a raft of measures designed to demonstrate its determination to combat radical Islamism and reinforce the secularist values of the Republic
Students have been banned from wearing the abaya
and state subsidies for Muslim schools and colleges cut back
the education minister announced plans to close a prominent Muslim academy in Nice
saying its funding was ‘contrary to the anti-separatism law’ introduced in 2021
Attempts have also been made to introduce immigration quotas and make it harder for incomers to bring their families to France
Not so the law at the centre of this story — the new Immigration Act
which contains some of the government’s most stringent new measures
Among them is the right of the authorities to ‘visit’ (a euphemism for raid) the homes of residents deemed to have spoken or acted seditiously
confiscate their national identity documents
triumphally cited the imam’s fast-track removal as proof that it will protect the nation from extremist enemies within
‘No call to hatred will go unanswered,’ he declared
making to sure to emphasise that the preacher’s allegedly inflammatory comments had been reported to the public prosecutor on his personal instructions
Mahjoubi claims the minister was so eager to see him become the first ‘symbolic example’ of the crackdown on radicalism in mosques that he flew from Paris to Nimes to sign the expulsion order himself
The lightning dismissal of this obscure imam has certainly caught the nation’s attention
sparking handwringing debates on French political talk shows and in highbrow newspapers
opponents such as migrant support group attorneys dismiss the new act as a blatant vote-catcher that wasn’t even necessary to deport Mahjoubi
Powers to expel undesirables in cases of ‘absolute emergency’ were first introduced following World War II
44 people linked to radical Islam and deemed to be dangerous were summarily kicked out of France
other immigration lawyers say the so-called Darmanin Act undoubtedly hastened Mahjoubi’s repatriation
non-citizens could avoid or postpone their removal by destroying — or conveniently ‘losing’ — identity documents
placing the onus on the French authorities to prove their nationality
Legitimising home raids and passport seizures means this ruse will no longer work
Given the huge obstacles the UK government must overcome before banishing even the most dangerous of resident non-citizens
many would doubtless like to see the British authorities handed similarly tough powers
One thinks of the 12 years and millions of pounds in legal fees expended to send the poisonous hate-preacher Abu Qatada
whose videos were found in the 9/11 hijackers’ lairs
Then there is the bureaucratic nightmare of trying to rid these shores of murderers
robbers and rapists who inveigle their way into the UK and remain here with help of resourceful lawyers and generous legal aid
our countries are not just separated by a Channel
‘The French authorities have a long-standing right to remove someone who is not a French citizen, provided it is to a country that is not unsafe,’ says former Supreme Court judge Lord Sumption
‘The right to remain in France is a police matter and regarded as discretionary
Britain has a completely different legal tradition.’
Life in Tunisia may be less comfortable than in provincial France
the imam has been unceremoniously shunted back to the country of his birth
Had he made those same remarks in a mosque in Birmingham
it would probably have been a pointless waste of time for anyone to report him
While no one I spoke to in Bagnols-sur-Ceze believes he is a hatemonger in the Qatada vein
and his flock (including a Birkenhead-born Muslim with a French-Scouse accent) backed his claim to be a voice of moderation
where protesters can — and do — openly abuse the Union Jack in any way they chose
so long as the rectangular cloth belongs to them
France fiercely protects its cherished Tricolore
Designed by revolutionaries in 1790 as a contrast to the elaborate pennants flown by the nobility, its three simple stripes have since been copied by many other nations, including Italy, Germany, Ireland and India.
As in many other countries, desecration of the national flag is an imprisonable offence (in Turkey, the maximum sentence is 18 years). As Mahjoubi ought to have known, even to disrespect it verbally at a public gathering can have serious consequences.
Moreover, having already been taken to task for teaching local children religious lessons inside the mosque complex — in breach of French law governing the use of municipal buildings — he should have realised his videoed speeches were being monitored by the regional authorities, which is how his inflammatory words came to their attention.
In fact, by some accounts they had previously warned him to temper his fervid speeches.
True or not, on the Friday in question he went too far, not only appearing to damn the Tricolore but allegedly branding Jews as ‘the enemy’ and calling for the destruction of Western society.
Putting his side of the story to me this week, during a lengthy interview in his Tunisian in-laws’ whitewashed villa, the imam rejected every such claim.
When alluding to the national flag, Jewish people and the female sex, he maintained, he had been quoting from Islamic scriptures that envisage scenes on the final day of reckoning.
Had his words been interpreted in that context, instead of being applied to contemporary France, no one could possibly have been offended or incited to hatred.
Why, then, had he been singled out? Because, he said in a whispery voice that contrasted starkly with the stridently excitable tones one hears on his videos, the Interior Minister was vaunting his new law and needed ‘a scapegoat’.
‘It was only a word, just one misplaced word,’ he says again, though whole passages of his speech were cited as grounds for his expulsion.
‘I was the first to suffer but it (the new law) will do a lot of damage to Muslims. I think imams will have to be really, really careful about what they are saying from now on.’
Quite so, and many would suggest that is no bad thing.
As I am leaving this woebegone man, he espouses his admiration for Britain.
Though he hasn’t been to our country, he praises its tolerance, and a system that allows independent judges, rather than politicians, to rule on cases such as his. So much fairer, he muses, than in France.
‘They would never do this to an imam in England. A minister wouldn’t be allowed to throw me out. I’d have the chance to defend myself in court.’
With dollops of unwitting bathos, he fixes me with a meaningful gaze and adds: ‘So, I appeal to King Charles — and I hope he soon gets better — to help me!’
Perhaps the imam’s Anglophile outpouring was sincere. A cynic might suspect it to have been affected in the hope of winning the Daily Mail’s sympathy.
Last night his legal team in Paris launched a last-ditch challenge to bring him home from Tunisia.
Yet his gushing homage to Britain, with its more clement form of justice, is unlikely to have warmed French patriots to his dubious cause.
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Reconquest’s strategy “Find place’s scale”: The stake is to reconquest the human scale in building and outdoor spaces by a better distribution of the buildings. The project draws one’s inspiration from campus model, which presents the advantage to be flexible and to allow a better identification of education’s poles. This intervention process also allows to students to find easily a way and fit into a social life while being supervised (easy reading of circulations, gratitude of spaces).
© Paul KozlowskiThinking a sustainable development project requires taking account of qualitative materials, technical work on energy management, but also a logical layout of workplaces.
It is in the sense that we began this project, by joining in the time.The intervention that we propose allows to restore coherence and feature to the set by means of a new spatial scenography.
© Paul KozlowskiThe last building designed with landscaping
reflects this logic and strategy of reconquest the place
It hosts an application restaurant as well as teaching rooms
Particular attention has been given to the building envelope
Working on a set thickness of the transitional area between the inside and the outside
the skin of the building is available in a colorful alternating between aluminum panels painted and sun breezes
The sun breezes offer vibrations that contrast with the concrete shell
The facilities offer specific meeting places around vegetated entity
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Flood water makes 140,000 homeless in Myanmar
displace thousands in India’s Kerala state
A group of 18 students from St Michael School
accompanied by four others from St Aloysius' College
recently returned from a week-long visit to the region of Bagnols-sur-Cèze
The visit reciprocated an earlier visit to Malta by a group of French students from Collège Bernard de Ventadour
and the student exchange formed part of an e-twinning project that St Michael School has with the college
the soirée théâtrale at Uzès
the Musée d'Art Sacré de Pont-Saint-Esprit
apart from going for walks in woods and by rivers
In Bagnols-sur-Cèze's salle de la Pyramide
the Maltese students performed in both French and Maltese the play Matti written by Joe Friggieri and directed by Clive Piscopo
and Elaine Pace accompanied the students during the visit
For their week-long visit to Malta the French students attended the school's sports and cultural evenings and were taken on excursions around the Maltese Islands
including tours of Ħaġar Qim and Mnajdra and visits to Mdina and Gozo
arranged by project co-ordinator Tonio Caruana
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