"France has made thousands of Oradour-sur-Glane in Algeria": Arcom examines Jean-Michel Aphatie's remarks

Did Jean-Michel Aphatie overstep the mark? This is what Arcom is about to decide. According to AFP, the audiovisual regulatory body has opened an investigation following the journalist's comments made in the RTL studio on February 25 about "Oradour-sur-Glane in Algeria" allegedly committed by France.

"Every year in France, we commemorate what happened in Oradour-sur-Glane, that is to say the massacre of an entire village. But we have committed hundreds of them, in Algeria. Are we aware of that?" the journalist declared on RTL on Tuesday, regarding the conquest of Algeria by France in the 19th century.

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As a reminder, in Oradour-sur-Glane, a martyr village in Limousin, a unit of the Waffen SS Das Reich heading back to the front in Normandy massacred 642 inhabitants on June 10, 1944. "We didn't do Oradour-sur-Glane in Algeria," retorted the presenter Thomas Sotto before asking him: "Did we behave like Nazis?" "The Nazis behaved like us," replied Jean-Michel Apathie without hesitation.

These remarks prompted several reports to Arcom, which, as usual in such cases, opened an investigation to determine whether the radio station had failed in its obligations. Political leaders also reacted. "The comparison dared by Jean-Michel Apathie is an odious falsification of history and an insult to all those repatriated from Algeria," tweeted RN president Jordan Bardella. "Jean-Michel Aphatie has taken on the role of an Algerian preacher," in the eyes of Éric Ciotti (UDR).

Vice-president of Île-de-France, Florence Portelli (LR), who was on set with Jean-Michel Apathie on Tuesday, was also immediately outraged: "To dare to compare that to Nazism, to compare that to Oradour-sur-Glane. (...) It has nothing to do with it." On X, she accused the journalist of "spitting on France and playing into the hands of the propaganda of the Algerian dictatorship which tends to erase the massacres committed by the Islamists and to stir up hatred against our country."

These exchanges come at a time of high tensions between the two countries. Algiers has repeatedly refused in recent weeks to allow several of its nationals expelled from France to enter its territory.