Karim Benzema He is one of the great protagonists of the press around the world for his goal in extra time against Manchester City to put Real Madrid in the Champions League final. However, in his country, in France, in addition to his good work on the pitch He is also in the news for his lawsuit against one of the important men of the Reconquest party (Reconquest in French), Damien Rieu. as published The Parisianthe striker has taken legal action to accuse the politician of public defamation for two tweets he posted in 2020.
The first was published on October 23, 2020 and contained a photograph of the footballer posing next to the imam of Meaux, Nourdine Mamoune. “Interesting to discover that Benzema frequents the imam Nourdine Mamoune, who just been investigated (in the framework of an operation for the murder of Samuel Paty and for which he was never prosecuted). I am looking forward to the courts taking an interest in the financing of the mosques in Bron (from the region Karim comes from)”, wrote the former spokesman for the far-right group Génération Identitaire until its dissolution in 2021.
Just one month later, specifically on November 22, 2020, Damien Rieu charged against Benzema again on social networks. On that occasion he published an image in which the player appears raising their index finger towards the sky, a gesture used as an expression of faith. He accompanied the photograph with that of several terrorists who make the same movement since, according to experts, the Islamic State has tried to appropriate it. “I think Benzema wants to send us a message”, expressed Riau to accompany the images. The two tuis are still in the defendant’s profile.
Benzema’s lawyer, Sylvain Cormier, has already shown his outrage in the same publication and mentioned Emmanuel Macron and the Minister of the Interior, Gérald Darmanin: “Multi-recidivist far-right activist Damien Lefèvre (Damien Rieu’s real name) is fueling hate. His last tweet equates Benzema with a terrorist. Do we have to wait for a new tragedy to react? ”, He asked himself.
A cercano hombre to Éric Zemmour
Damien Rieu is a member of the Reconquista, the political party founded at the end of last year by Éric Zemmour for the 2022 presidential elections which took place just a few weeks ago. The founder made headlines precisely during the campaign after he was expelled from Zidane’s sports complex a few kilometers from Marseille. Now he is one of his main militants, who has been summoned for the hearing that will take place on May 23 in the court of Lyon.
“Karim wants to shut me up… Tell him I’ve won all my cases”, expressed the defendant in statements collected The Parisian. “I don’t want to talk about the substance of the matter yet, but from what I see in the summons, defamation seems very difficult to qualify in this case”, added his lawyer, who understands that there will not be a sentence until the beginning of next year.
It should be remembered that Damien Rieu has already been prosecuted for entering the roof of a Poitiers mosque in 2012 and for having participated in an anti-immigration operation in the Alps in 2018. In both cases he was released on appeal..
