Why is the interior minister attacking football star Karim Benzema over a Gaza tweet?

Minister of the Interior Gérald Darmanin has criticized Karim Benzema over a Gaza tweet and accused the football star of supporting the Muslim Brotherhood. What is the story behind this?

In a television interview with the CNews channel, France’s interior minister Gérald Darmanin claimed that Karim Benzema was “notoriously connected to the Muslim Brotherhood”. Since then, the football star’s lawyer has vehemently rejected this accusation.

French media even report that 35-year-old Benzema told his lawyer that he did not know exactly what the Muslim Brotherhood was, and had only heard vaguely about it. The 35-year-old from Lyon has been under contract with the Saudi club Al-Ittihad since this season. And Saudi Arabia regards the Muslim Brotherhood as a terrorist organization. The group, which some view as radical Islamist, has also been banned in Egypt, where the Muslim Brotherhood was founded in 1928, since 2013.

Benzema’s tweet on Gaza

The Minister of the Interior cited a tweet from Benzema as the background to the dispute, in which the French national player and Ballon d’Or 2022 writes: “We pray for the people of Gaza, who have once again become victims of these unjust bombings that spare neither women nor children.”

Green opposition politician Sandrine Rousseau wondered if the interior minister had nothing better to do than deal with a footballer’s tweets.

Gérald Darmanin – who is very active on X himself – called on Karim Benzema to write a tweet of condolence for the teacher killed in Arras.

Benzema’s lawyer Hugues Vigier advised his client in the French media not to be blackmailed by the interior minister.

Darmanin puts himself forward as a possible successor to Macron

The 41-year-old Gérald Darmanin is positioning himself as one of the possible successors to French President Emmanuel Macron. His omnipresence in law-and-order matters is reminiscent of former head of state and interior minister Nicolas Sarkozy.

Darmanin or Attal?

But the former mayor of Tourcoing in northern France is not the only minister who wants to score points domestically with pithy words and announcements in the fight against Islamism.

After a teacher was murdered by a former student, France’s education minister, Gabiel Attal, declared that he no longer wanted radicalized young people in French schools. The 34-year-old former Socialist Attal received applause from conservatives and the far right for his statement.

Emmanuel Macron is no longer allowed to run for president after two terms.