Scott Ott, the great Blogosphere satirist, "reports" on the Paris riots:

(2005-11-03) — After seven nights of riots by youth in predominantly-Muslim sections of Paris, French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin (who is a man) announced today that police would pull out of areas where dozens of cars burn each night to “let the freedom-fighting insurgents govern themselves.”

“Just like the United States should not force democracy upon Muslims in Iraq,” said Mr. de Villepin, “we should not impose our own provincial thinking about the so-called ‘rule of law’ on Muslim immigrants who have established a homeland in Paris. We’re withdrawing our occupation forces immediately.”

The Prime Minister, who, when he was Foreign Minister, vigorously opposed the U.S.-led war against Saddam Hussein’s Iraq, today enthusiastically endorsed self-determination for “these peaceful religious people in our midst.”

Even absent radical Islamism, the French should have foreseen the disaster that has presently come upon them, and had a plan to handle it. After 9/11, the French should have responded proactively to counter the push for French Muslims to join efforts with al-Qaeda and other kinds of terrorist groups. Whether through fatalism or Gallic arrogance, the French has refused to acknowledge the danger -- and now the economic frustration has joined with the religious lunacy of Islamofascism to turn parts of one of the capitals of the West into little more than Fallujah-sur-Seine.

The police have long avoided patrols in these areas, preferring to leave the Muslims there to their own devices -- and they have understood the message: France will not fight for her own territory. Even responsible Muslims have no choice under those circumstances to work within the power structure that arises in these ghettoes, thanks to French surrender. The result has not been rioting, as understood by the press, but rather a series of running battles between France's belated response to the violence and proto-terrorists using the same hit-and-run field tactics seen by Coalition forces in Fallujah and other cities in Iraq. The only weapons they lack are explosives for IEDs, and so the fatality rate has stayed low -- at least thus far.