France suspends Gaza refugee programme after student’s Hitler support revealed

France has suspended a programme to allow Palestinians from Gaza into the country, after a recent arrival was revealed to have praised Hitler and two days after the 7 October attacks shared a call for the hostages taken by Hamas to be murdered on camera, “befitting the joy of what occurred”.

Nour Attalah, a student from Gaza who was brought to France last week as part of a programme organised by the French Consulate General in Jerusalem, was due to begin the next term at a university in the city of Lille. However, the university announced that it had cancelled her student visa after comments reportedly shared by Attalah were revealed.

The alleged comments included a video of Hitler with the caption “Hitler: kill the Jews everywhere. I don’t want a Jewish lineage on this earth, you must kill them before they kill you.” On the morning of Saturday 7 October 2023, shortly after the beginning of the Hamas attack on Israel which saw the terrorist group slaughter 1,200 and take 250 hostage, Atallah tweeted “thank God”. On 9 October 2023, she reportedly shared a comment which read: “The execution of hostages should not be random or hasty. The filming should be of high quality, befitting the joy of what occurred on Saturday morning.”

Atallah is believed to be niece of Ayoub Atallah, who was the bodyguard for Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, the founder of Hamas. Both were killed in a targeted Israeli strike in 2004. The university in Lille told France 24 that told the news agency that the posts were “in direct contradiction with the values upheld” by the institution.

The French Foreign Affairs Minister, Jean-Noël Barrot, under whose oversight the programme was being conducted, announced on Friday that “No operation of this type, no evacuation of any kind will take place until we have drawn the consequences of this investigation.”

He added that any individuals from Gaza who had entered France under the new programme “will be subject to a new check.” Atallah is believed to have left France for Qatar, with Barrot posting on social media on Sunday that “Nour Attalah has left the country. She had no place here. I had said it, and we have done it. This departure would not have been possible without the decisive efforts of the Foreign Office staff and those who supported them: I thank them for it.”

The announcement from the French government suspending its programme came as the British government announced its intention to bring hundreds of seriously ill or injured Gazan children to the UK for medical treatment.

According to a report in the Sunday Times, a parent or guardian from Gaza will be required to accompany each child.