French report links MAGA and Israeli accounts to riot narrative amplification
Internal assessments reveal that social media networks tied to the U.S. right and Israel drove millions of views on French unrest, while Russian actors used covert impersonation tactics.
By Jenna Mitchell ·
A review by France's Foreign Ministry found that social media accounts connected to Israel and the U.S. MAGA movement spread hostile stories about the recent riots in France.
The ministry’s internal assessment, which Reuters obtained, states that these actors tied the domestic unrest to radical Islamism and migration.
A separate analysis by the European Union found that a covert Russian network also tried to use the chaos for political gain.
That Russian effort involved blaming uncontrolled immigration for the violence and portraying the French government as having lost control.
The violence began in October when protests over rising living costs and poor public services turned into some of the worst riots France has seen in decades.
The EU analysis covered the period from October 7 to October 21.
It identified a network called Operation Overload that spread videos mimicking Western media outlets to target French viewers.
Some of these videos falsely claimed that migrants had raped protesters or that terrorist attacks were about to happen.
The report noted that the 10 most-viewed posts from pro-Russian sources gained 2.8 million views between October 16 and 18.
Posts linked to the MAGA movement and Israel reached far more people during that same window.
The top 10 posts from MAGA-linked officials, media outlets, and influencers received more than 49 million views.
The top 10 posts from Israeli officials, government accounts, media outlets, and influencers received more than 35 million views, according to the report. Reuters said it could not independently verify the claims in either document. The EU document described the Russian activity as the opportunistic exploitation of unrest, rather than evidence that Moscow instigated the protests. It stated that the goal was to depict French leadership as weak and increasingly authoritarian. Elina Treyger, a senior political scientist at the RAND Corporation, said such campaigns create a narrative competition that shapes how Western democracies are perceived in Europe and beyond. She said these efforts feed an anti-immigrant backlash that pushes European voters toward political extremes. The EU report noted that Operation Overload has been active since September 2023. It targets Western public figures, institutions, and media outlets to discredit them and their support for Ukraine. The Institute for Strategic Dialogue, a Britain-based think tank, described the operation last year as a persistent and high-volume Russian information operation. It uses artificial intelligence to clone experts’ voices, forges newspaper headlines, and manipulates images. France’s disinformation watchdog Viginum published a detailed report on the operation in 2024. French officials said such networks often resurface during protests, elections, or other opportunities to discredit the country. French President Emmanuel Macron said on October 21 that there was no visible foreign interference behind the protests, but there was foreign manipulation of information. He made these remarks in response to requests for comment. The office of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the French Foreign Ministry did not respond to requests for comment. The Russian Foreign Ministry also did not respond. In August, Russian spokesperson Maria Zakharova rejected allegations that Russia was spreading disinformation about France’s 2027 elections. She said the allegations would not be the last concoction the authorities would use to manipulate public opinion.
