Authorities in France are mobilizing tens of thousands of police officers and gendarmes as citizens prepare to ring in 2024 after officials warned of a "very high" terror threat on New Year's Eve.
"I’ve requested a very strong mobilization of police forces and the gendarmerie under the context of a very high terrorist threat, of course due to what’s happening in Israel and Palestine," said Gérard Darmanin, the French interior minister, according to The Telegraph.
The deployment includes 90,000 police officers and gendarmes along with "5,000 soldiers from Operation Sentinel, a military operation aimed at protecting the French from terror threats" plus "35,000 firefighters."
French officials said they will have 6,000 officers on patrol in Paris where as many as 1.5 million people are set to attend this year's countdown on the Champs-Elysées.
More on the threat environment in France via The Telegraph:
France has been on its highest state of counter-terrorism alert since mid-October, when a teacher in the northern town of Arras was stabbed to death by a radicalised former pupil who reportedly shouted “Allahu Akbar” as he attacked.
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Earlier this month, the interior minister instructed police forces to be extra vigilant over the recent Christmas holiday, which ultimately passed without incident.
“The presence of dissuasive law enforcement and the work of our intelligence services are extremely reassuring and effective for our fellow citizens who must continue to live and celebrate if they wish,” Mr Darmanin said.
In a rather French twist to the situation, the Telegraph noted that "Paris's own local, unarmed municipal police officers have chosen to go on strike on New Year's Eve and New Year's Day to demand higher wages" and unions in the country have threatened that "up to 80 per cent of municipal police forces could strike across the country on Dec 31 amid similar complaints."
Paris is set to host the 2024 Summer Olympics in July and August, but recent attacks by Hamas-inspired haven't scared officials into changing their plans for the opening ceremonies set to bring hundreds of thousands of people to the banks of the River Seine.
According to a Reuters report from early December, "[t]here is no 'plan B' for the opening ceremony of the Paris 2024 Olympic Summer Games," according to France's sports minister who was asked about alternate plans in the wake of a knife-and-hammer attack by a man who had pledged his allegiance to the Islamic State. "We have the capacity to secure the event," she maintained.
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