Is Europe Under Communist Assault?

What’s fueling the riots in Europe?

The sometimes-peaceful protests happening in France, Italy, Belgium, Spain, and other countries are largely reported as backlash to poor school conditions, housing crises, and the overall high cost of living. As legitimate as those problems are, there is more to the mayhem than high-schoolers crying out for more teachers and cleaner classrooms.  

Some high-profile figures have attributed the chaos to decades of third-world mass migration. U.S. Vice President JD Vance is one of them. So are leaders associated with Germany’s ascending nationalist part, the AfD. In a Facebook post, Benjamin Nolte, an AfD state lawmaker in Bavaria, wrote that “Antifa and Migrantifa are mobilizing together” under the Gen Z banner “to plunge our country into chaos.”

But news reports, comments from officials, and intelligence analyses suggest the common denominator in the European riots is not immigrants, but radical leftism. In fact, if one were to skip reading any articles and just looked at enough footage of the marches, they’d notice an awful lot of flags with the hammer and sickle as well as those with the all-too-familiar black backdrop and raised fist commonly associated with Antifa.

But there is another flag that keeps showing up. That is the Palestinian flag, which has become common in leftist demonstrations.

France

France is the epicenter of the mayhem. In addition to their mastery of all things bread, pastries, and art, the French also have a rich tradition of protesting. Demonstrations have been going on, to some degree, since September. The number of people who’ve turned out ranges from half a million to more than 800,000, depending on the day and whom you ask. French authorities cite the lower numbers, while journalists and people tied to the groups that are involved claim that up to a million people have come out. And, as videos show, many of the protests have devolved into all-out turmoil. Melissa Brodsky described on her Substack what happened in Paris recently:

Rioters also smashed shop windows and looted businesses while police chased more hooligans through the streets. Vehicles burned, public buildings were damaged, and arrests grew throughout the weekend. Police officers and demonstrators were both counted among the injured.

The French demonstrators inspired protests in Belgium. According to The Irish Times, “Tens of thousands marched in protest at school conditions and austerity measures on October 9, and a smaller protest about the cost of living on October 17 saw violent clashes with police.”

Italy

Italy, too, has seen rounds of intense criminality intermingled with peaceful protests. In Rome, tens of thousands took to the streets. In Milan, the government deployed army troops. Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni passed an emergency decree to prevent and contain the mayhem. The decree “reduces the presumed age of criminal responsibility to 14, extends powers of preventive detention from the age of 16, introduces fines for the parents of minors involved in disorder, and introduces a new crime of organised violence at public protests.”

Spain

In Spain, housing is considered the driving factor. European media reported that the eviction of an 87-year-old woman was a major trigger of the outrage:

Anger crystallised around the eviction and subsequent death of 87-year-old Maricarmen Abascal, a Madrid widow who lost her flat of 60 years after an investment firm bought it and she couldn’t afford the rent hike. Protesters set up encampments in some cities.

Germany

Germany is scheduled to see big demonstrations this weekend. A youth group called “Gen Z steht auf” or “Gen Z regelt” (“Gen Z stands up,” “Gen Z regulates”) is calling for protests, modeled on the French ones, on October 31 in 21 German cities. German authorities are already warning that malign actors will try to weaponize the demonstrations. German media report that security officials are alerting people that parts of the left-wing extremist scene and isolated groups from “foreign-related extremism” could intend to hijack the demonstrations.  

Radical Fingerprints

French authorities also blame radical leftism for the violence. On September 28, the intelligence department of the Paris police headquarters put together a report on the riots in Seine-Saint-Denis. It found that many of those involved had no ties to the schools. The report said the riots were caused by students and “political movements close to the extreme left.” The agency blamed the left-wing party La France Insoumise (LFI).

Marine Le Pen, who will become the next president of France (if allowed), also pointed the finger at the LFI. On October 18, she said in a short video speech: “Millions of French people are angry, but do not break, do not pillage.… LFI and its branches are social arsonists, they add problem to problem.”

A Fox investigative report produced by Senior Investigations Editor Asra Nomani discovered that, of the 50 organizations involved in the French protests and riots, only 15 of them were youth groups. The other 35 included labor unions, radical left groups, and leftist agitators, some with ties to communist groups. Two of the adult groups, according to Nomani, are “really strong Islamist groups.”

Billionaire Backing

The Spanish daily La Gaceta published a report saying that “several organizations” backing the demonstrations in France “have documented links to Open Society Foundations, the network of foundations created by George Soros.” For longtime readers of this publication, it would probably be more surprising if Soros’ name did not come up at all in this conversation.

But Soros isn’t the only American billionaire linked to the insurgency raging in Europe. Nomani’s Fox report points to an American tech billionaire. Nomani reported:

From France to the United States, the United Kingdom, Brazil, Greece and India, adults with deep pockets are tapping France’s school protests and turning a domestic education dispute into a platform for broader political and ideological confrontation. BreakThrough News is a pro-communist propaganda outlet based in New York City, funded by an American-born, Shanghai-based communist tech tycoon, Neville Roy Singham, who has financed a network of communist and far-left groups in the U.S. that have capitalized on grievances to stoke similar street unrest for almost a decade.

Mike Gonzalez, a senior fellow at the Heritage Foundation, told Fox News that the riots are the result of the same communist and Islamic factors that organized assaults in the U.S. not too long ago. Gonzalez:

What we’re seeing here is the same Red-Green ecosystem that disrupts infrastructure choke holds in our country such as the Brooklyn Bridge, college campuses and congressional hearings. And in the case of BreakThrough News, the same sugar daddy — Neville Roy Singham.

Chinese Connection

While Singham’s radical activism is not as recognized as Soros’, Congress knows all about it. The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform has an open investigation into Singham. In a September 2025 press release, the committee labeled him “a U.S. billionaire with reported ties to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and extremist organizations fueling division and civil unrest across the United States.” The committee alleged that Singham affiliates contributed to the riots in Los Angeles last year. It cites a New York Times report which said that Singham “has built a dark money network funneling millions through nonprofits like the United Community Fund and Justice Education Fund to pro-CCP media outlets such as Maku Group, whose office prominently displays loyalty to Xi Jinping.” The Times outright accused Singham of working “closely with the Chinese government media machine” and “financing its propaganda worldwide.”

China isn’t the only foreign agent suspected of inflaming the riots. A 52-page report put together by Alliance 4Europe, which is funded by Poland’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, says that Russian- and Iranian-funded propaganda campaigns consisting of more than 1,000 articles in nine languages through the Pravda network, and hundreds of bot messages on social media, are throwing fuel on the fire.   

The mayhem is expected to continue. Large demonstrations are planned to happen this Saturday in France. The French government is deploying 70,000 police officers. This could turn out to be a legitimately scary Halloween.