Flames, tear gas and stun grenades: How a stoush over classrooms and toilets exploded into violent mass protests

In some of the most violent moments, protesters set bins on fire and spread flames on the streets.

When the police responded, they sometimes used tear gas and stun grenades.

On Monday, one young man lost a hand in a confrontation with police involving a grenade at a school in the northern French town of Lens. In some accounts, he picked up the grenade when it landed near him. His family denied this claim.

On Tuesday, authorities placed a police officer under investigation for firing a grenade launcher last week in the Paris suburb of Saint-Ouen-l’Aumône. That incident left one student, named as Eden, 14, with face wounds, according to reports in the French media.

Some protesters have turned their violence on fellow citizens. Police arrested a boy, 15, after an assault in Marseille last Friday when he fired a home-made flamethrower at a woman near a bus stop, burning her face. The moment was captured on video and spread on social media.

Even if some teenagers wanted to keep politics out of the protests, it was far too late for that on Tuesday.

Some of the strongest support for the rallies comes from left-wing leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon, who is preparing a run for the presidency to replace Macron at national elections early next year.

“Thank you to the thousands of young people who will be demonstrating today,” he said on Tuesday. “Our country is fortunate to have a young generation involved in its destiny and ready to take it in hand.”

Mélenchon’s party, La France Insoumise, or LFI, translates as “France Unbowed”. There is no mistaking his mission in using the uprising from young people to expand a progressive movement that could sweep him into power.

On the right, however, National Rally leader Marine Le Pen has a political blueprint that counters the case for more government spending. On Tuesday, she issued a policy with cuts of about €140 billion ($226 billion) to government spending over five years if she wins power.

Le Pen accepts some of the student grievances. She promised to increase teacher salaries and restore security to schools, saying the shortage of teachers needed a solution.

Even so, there is a direct political confrontation over the clashes on the streets. Le Pen backed police while Mélenchon sided with the protesters.

“This is no longer about high school student protests,” Le Pen said last Thursday.

“It is about riots organised by professionals and overseen by deputies from La France Insoumise. We must pass a new anti-rioters law so that participation in a riot is a clearly identified offence.”

In the end, the verdict on these protests will be delivered when French voters go to the ballot boxes in April and May next year in two rounds of the presidential election.

So far, the right is on the rise. A poll by Toluna-Harris at the end of September found that Le Pen would gain more votes than others in the first round of voting. In the second round, it said, she would defeat Mélenchon with 69 per cent of the vote.

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