It seems like once again someone has decided to turn this thread into accusatory and personal attacks. Is nothing sacred anymore ? Is it more important to voice a quarrelsome opinion rather than seek news from Paris and send our condolences? If you want to discuss the political implications or rant about a post please go to the lounge.

In an effort to retain some gravity on this thread, I saw the following on the news:

At a memorial for the victims where Parisians were placing flowers, candles and written messages, a young boy wrote the following:

L' amour gagne toujours. Let us pray this is so.

Tell M. Hollande that it's too soon to talk politics, won't you, janisj? Perhaps that will satisfy you.

I'm sorry to provide such an easy target, but that sanctimony sickens me. Who are you, janisj, to tell anyone here what to post and where? Who are you to use the dead in Paris to make a petty jibe on this meaningless board? Have you absolutely no sense of decency?

For the moment, Hollande is talking national defense, which is not quite the same thing as politics. However, Sarkozy is talking politics because he would have done everything differently and this never would have happened... Yeah, sure.

If you would like to see some photos of these places in the news, I have a few from yesterday: http://tinyurl.com/oc8gum9

Thank you Kerouac for the information and photo link. Glad to see at least some sanity still prevails. Could still do without the personal attacks. The young boys plea that love always wins seems to get lost in such vitriolic rhetoric.

It seems the more of the world you have seen, the less frightened you are.

I have a pic of somebody I adored.

On it is written 'l'amour ne meurt jamais' - the kind of pic you are given at a funeral.

A few more of those are going to be handed very soon with very simiar messages here in Paris.

Why don't we just triangle this whole thread and get it over with?

Magnum has a beautiful series of photographs up. It was during Paris Photo, so lots of very good photographers were in the city.

http://www.magnumphotos.com/Package/2K1HRG6KK225

Sad to report that there was another fatal shooting in France yesterday, although unrelated to terrorism. In the village of Hégenheim, near the Swiss border, and where one of my best friends from work lives, a 13 year old boy shot dead a 12 year old on his way home from school. Not clear yet where the boy got the gun, whether he deliberately shot the other boy or whether it was an accident (all too common when kids and guns are in the same picture). The dead boy's mother is in hospital in "horrendous shock" and the whole region is also in shock.

kerouac, I have to disagree. Hollande's rhetoric has sounded more directed to saving his presidential chances than a considered response to how best to protect France from further murderous attacks from ISIS. It is sad and predictable but still no less amazing to see the short-term response from Hollande head straight for repeating all the mistakes made in the immediate aftermath of 9/11. One hopes the international community will refuse to go along and that a serious international effort to resolve the war in Syria will fast forward -- but it is a slender hope.

The European Union unanimously pledged its military support today, as did John Kerry. Do you think they are all idiots?

https://uk.news.yahoo.com/eu-unanimo...3.html#g0sCSKV

I think Hollande's request is very remarkable. By making it and by other nations not wanting to be shown up, he's made the EU into a military organization. So yes, I think they're all idiots. This course of action will make things worse, not better.

the Lisbon treatise article in question:

7. If a Member State is the victim of armed aggression on its territory, the other Member States shall have towards it an obligation of aid and assistance by all the means in their power, in accordance with Article 51 of the United Nations Charter. This shall not prejudice the specific character of the security and defence policy of certain Member States.

Commitments and cooperation in this area shall be consistent with commitments under the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation, which, for those States which are members of it, remains the foundation of their collective defence and the forum for its implementation.

And this is the accompanying protocol:

BEARING IN MIND that the policy of the Union in accordance with Article 42 shall not prejudice the specific character of the security and defence policy of certain Member States and shall respect the obligations of certain Member States, which see their common defence realised in NATO, under the North Atlantic Treaty and be compatible with the common security and defence policy established within that framework.

This is how world wars are born, because this "assistance" will now have to be expressed within the Nato framework. Turkey is a Nato member. The US will not be dragged in further than it wants to, ie, no boots on the ground, air strikes only.

And Russia is bombing any insurgent except IS.

Absolutely perfect photos Kerouac...thank you for sharing those...they really tell a very sad story and the impact of a still photo for me far exceeds media coverage.

treatise = treaty

I agree menachem, with the part about the idiots, but I hold out a fragile hope that other European countries are not going to backed into a corner to make themselves terror targets following Hollande's failed policies.

what we see at the moment, across Europe, is dangerous, half fascist, nativist politics in the north, anti austerity populism in the south. Additionally, it's the grass roots, civic organisations who are bearing the weight of rescuing and providing for the mass of refugees arriving at the EU's southern borders. And it's the civic organisations who are now coming together and share a vision that I find much more politically and socially compelling than that of the politicians who are leading us down the rabbit hole of increasing instability, fear and war.

So I have high hopes for Europeans, but the EU in its totality is a failing organisation.

Just hope this does not give Mdm Le Pen a big push as I'm afraid it may in the next Presidential elections for her right-wing anti-immigrant party that has been trying to moderate ifs staunch farther right stances under her Holocuast-denying father - the notorious Jean-Marie Le Pen.

Hmm, it will. In NL nativist PVV is now at 38 seats in the polls, and is the largest party in parliament. Virtually, but in this climate everything is possible, early elections too.

Hollande will be slaughtered in the next presidential elections.