“An infamous attack”, “ashamed to the anti -Semitic profanator” … The slaughter of the tree planted in memory of Ilan Halimi arouses indignation. An investigation was opened this Friday, August 15.
The olive tree planted in memory of Ilan Halimi in Épinay-sur-Seine (Seine-Saint-Denis) was shot in the night from Wednesday to Thursday August 14. He paid tribute to the young Jewish man discovered naked, gagged, handcuffed and carrying traces of torture and burns in February 2006, committed by the “Gang des Barbars”. The victim died during his transfer to the hospital.
An open investigation
Julien Charles, prefect of Seine-Saint-Denis, announced that an investigation is open. The state representative was present this Friday, August 15 in Épinay-sur-Seine alongside the Grand Rabbi of France Haïm Korsia.
The prefect deemed “important” to go where the olive tree was shot “to say […] that the investigation will succeed, that we will succeed in identifying the author of these facts, that he will be translated to justice “.
The mayor of Épinay-sur-Seine had filed a complaint on Thursday, August 14 for degradation, according to a police source.
Emmanuel Macron denounces an “act of hatred”
President Emmanuel Macron assured on X that the Republic would be “always uncompromising” in the face of anti -Semitism. “Bringing down the tree paying homage to Ilan Halimi is trying to kill him a second time. It will not be anything: the nation will not forget this child of France dead because Jew. All means are deployed to punish this act of hatred,” said the head of state.
Bringing down the tree paying homage to Ilan Halimi is trying to kill him a second time. It will be nothing: the nation will not forget this child of France dead because Jewish.
All means are deployed to punish this act of hatred.
Faced with anti -Semitism: the Republic, …
– Emmanuel Macron (@emmanuelmacron) August 15, 2025
Politicians are indignant
Several other political figures have denounced the act of vandalism.
Prime Minister François Bayrou spoke on his X account. “The tree for Ilan Halimi, living bulwark against oblivion, was mowed by anti-Semitic hatred. No crime can uproot memory. The fight never completed against the mortal poison of hatred is our primary duty,” he wrote.
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Olivier Faure, the first secretary of the Socialist Party also reacted in a publication on the same social network. “Shame on the anti-Semitic profanator who had to think that this act was of infinite courage …”, he said.
Eric Ciotti, President of the UDR (Union of Laws for the Republic), denounced on X “an abominable symbol of the explosion of anti -Semitism in our country as much as an infamous attack on the memory of the martyr of Ilan Halimi”.
In Épinay-sur-Seine, the tree in tribute to Ilan Halimi was shot. It is an abominable symbol of the explosion of anti -Semitism in our country as much as an infamous attack on the memory of the martyr of Ilan Halimi.
The barbarians at the origin of this forfeiture are only … pic.twitter.com/mW73pI772i
@ECIETTICO August 15, 2025
A new tree will be planted
Mathieu Hanotin, president of the territorial public establishment Plaine Commune, to which Épinay-sur-Seine belongs, is committed to a press release “to a new commemorative tree to be replanted as soon as possible”.
Two other trees paying tribute to Ilan Halimi had been vandalized in 2019 in Sainte-Geneviève-des-Bois, in Essonne, where the young man, then aged 23, had been found dying on the edge of a railway.