Lethal Provocation : The Constantine Murders and the Politics of French Algeria / Joshua Cole.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Cole, Joshua, Author.

Series:

Cornell scholarship online.

Cornell scholarship online

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Ethnic conflict--Algeria--Constantine--History--20th century.

Ethnic conflict.

Riots--Algeria--Constantine--History--20th century.

Riots.

Jews--Algeria--Constantine--History.

Jews.

France--Politics and government--1914-1940.

France.

Constantine (Algeria)--History--20th century.

Constantine (Algeria).

Constantine (Algeria)--Ethnic relations.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (336 pages)

Place of Publication:

Ithaca, NY : Cornell University Press, [2019]

Language Note:

In English.

Summary:

Part murder mystery, part social history of political violence, Lethal Provocation is a forensic examination of the deadliest peacetime episode of anti-Jewish violence in modern French history. Joshua Cole reconstructs the 1934 riots in Constantine, Algeria, in which tensions between Muslims and Jews were aggravated by right-wing extremists, resulting in the deaths of twenty-eight people. Animating the unrest was Mohamed El Maadi, a soldier in the French army. Later a member of a notorious French nationalist group that threatened insurrection in the late 1930s, El Maadi became an enthusiastic supporter of France's Vichy regime in World War II, and finished his career in the German SS. Cole cracks the "cold case" of El Maadi's participation in the events, revealing both his presence at the scene and his motives in provoking violence at a moment when the French government was debating the rights of Muslims in Algeria. Local police and authorities came to know about the role of provocation in the unrest and killings and purposely hid the truth during the investigation that followed. Cole's sensitive history brings into high relief the cruelty of social relations in the decades before the war for Algerian independence.

Contents:

Frontmatter

Contents

Acknowledgments

Note on Transliteration

Map 1. Northern Algeria during the colonial period

Map 2. The city of Constantine in 1934

Introduction

Part 1: Algerian Histories of Empire

1. Constantine in North African History

2. "Native," "Jewish," and "European"

3. The Crucible of Local Politics

Part 2: Colonial Society in Motion

4. The Postwar Moment

5. French Algeria's Dual Fracture

6. Provocation, Difference, and Public Space

7. Rehearsals for Crisis

Part 3: A Riot in France

8. Friday and Saturday, August 3-4, 1934

9. Sunday, August 5, 1934

10. Shock and Containment

Part 4: Making the Riot Algerian

11. Empire of Fright

12. The Police Investigation

13. The Agitator

14. The Trials

Conclusion

Appendix

Notes

Index

Notes:

Previously issued in print: 2019.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (publisher's Web site, viewed 29. Feb 2020)

ISBN:

9781501739439

1501739433

OCLC:

1065961218