Reuters Exclusive: EU Report Says Russia's Covert 'Operation Overload' Network Exploited France's October Riots With Fake Videos Blaming Migrants, While a French Foreign Ministry Report Says MAGA-Linked Accounts Drew 49 Million Views and Israeli Accounts 35 Million Pushing 'Hostile Narratives'
A covert Russian network used France's October riots to blame the unrest on uncontrolled immigration and portray the government as having lost control, according to an internal European Union assessment seen by Reuters. A separate internal assessment by France's foreign ministry, also seen by Reuters, found that accounts linked to Israel and to the U.S. MAGA movement pushed what it called hostile narratives around the same riots, tying them to radical Islamism and migration — and that posts from those accounts drew far more views than the Russian ones.
The riots erupted in cities across France last month after demonstrations against rising living costs and declining public services spiralled into some of the worst violence the country has seen in decades. The EU analysis, covering October 7 to 21, found that Russia sought to depict the French leadership as weak and increasingly authoritarian. It described the activity as the opportunistic exploitation of unrest, and found no evidence that Moscow or any other foreign actor had instigated or escalated the protests.
The EU report said the Russian network, known as Operation Overload, spread videos impersonating Western media outlets to French audiences — some falsely claiming that migrants had raped protesters or that terrorist attacks were imminent. The report said the network has been active since September 2023 and has targeted Western public figures, institutions and media outlets to discredit them and their support for Ukraine, while promoting content aligned with Russian interests — including the claim that European governments prioritise Ukraine over domestic issues.
The Institute for Strategic Dialogue, a Britain-based think tank, said in a report last year that Operation Overload creates videos that appear to be news reports, uses AI to clone experts' voices, forges newspaper headlines and manipulates images, pivoting from country to country to exploit crises and debates. France's disinformation watchdog Viginum published a detailed report on Overload and similar Russian operations in 2024, and French officials have said they resurface during protests, elections or other moments that can be used to discredit France.
The French foreign ministry's numbers told a different story about reach. The 10 most-viewed X posts on the unrest from pro-Russian spheres drew 2.8 million views between October 16 and 18. The 10 most-viewed posts by MAGA-linked officials, media outlets and influencers drew more than 49 million views in the same three days, and the 10 most-viewed posts from Israeli officials, government accounts, media outlets and influencers drew more than 35 million — posts that linked the riots to radical Islamism and migration.
Russia's foreign ministry did not respond to a request for comment; in August, its spokesperson Maria Zakharova rejected French watchdog allegations of Russian disinformation about France's 2027 elections as a concoction authorities use to manipulate public opinion. The Israeli prime minister's office and Israel's foreign ministry also did not respond. French officials pointed Reuters to President Emmanuel Macron's remarks of October 21: there had been no visible foreign interference behind the protests, he said, but there had been foreign manipulation of information. Reuters said it was not able to independently verify the assertions in either report, and both assessments are internal documents that have not been published.
For American readers, the finding cuts two ways: Europe's own investigators say the loudest foreign voices around France's riots were not Moscow's covert network but open American and Israeli accounts commenting on migration — a reminder that what U.S. audiences post about an ally's crisis is read abroad as America's voice. Elina Treyger, a senior political scientist at the RAND Corporation, said such campaigns wage a slow-burning narrative competition that over time can shape how Western democracies are seen, feeding an anti-immigrant backlash that pushes European voters toward political extremes.
Nothing in either assessment takes money out of any household's pocket, and no government has announced a policy change because of them. What they do offer ordinary citizens is a map of who is trying to shape what they see in a crisis — a covert Russian operation faking news reports on one side, and open political commentary on the other — so that the next viral video from a riot can be judged by where it came from, not just by how it feels.
📰 ProfiloPolitics Member News — choose your news, share it, earn credit:
https://white-curlew-963569.hostingersite.com
Never miss a story — Join our Telegram channel
Breaking U.S. political news, live as it happens — plus the stories the big outlets sit on.
Join ProfiloPolitics on Telegram