Police raid Paris bookshop over children’s colouring book about Palestine
French police raided a feminist and LGBTQIA+ bookshop in Paris in early January in an operation targeting a children’s colouring book about Palestine.
On 7 January, five uniformed police officers, accompanied by a prosecutor, searched Violette and Co, a well-known queer bookshop, in an attempt to seize copies of From the River to the Sea: A Colouring Book, the bookshop's owners announced on Friday.
The raid marked a sharp escalation from the summer, when the same title triggered far-right vandalism and threats against the shop, as well as a heated public debate about pro-Palestinian censorship in France.
The book by South African author and illustrator Nathi Ngubane explores Palestinian history and culture, the ongoing Israeli occupation and Palestinian resistance movements.
The Paris prosecutor confirmed that the operation followed a referral by the Ministry of the Interior, which denounced what it described as the book's "strong historical and ideological bias".
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The bookshop’s lawyer denounced the operation as "illegal and disproportionate".
Thibault Laforcade said the October recommendation to ban imports of the book by the Commission for the Surveillance and Control of Publications for Youth (CSCPJ) was a political position "without legal foundation", adding that only the Interior Ministry could issue a formal ban.
The bookshop said it was only informed after the raid of the unfavourable advisory opinion.
According to the bookshop, the search lasted around 45 minutes. Officers inspected shelves, storage rooms and boxes of books while wearing body cameras and prevented customers from entering.
No copies of the book were found or seized, as it was no longer in stock - Violette and Co said they had sold all of their copies by September.
The bookstore’s staff have been summoned for questioning later this month as part of a police investigation.
'Repressive obscenity'
In a statement following the raid, Violette and Co said it constituted an unprecedented police intervention in an independent cultural space and denounced what it called a form of political policing.
In a separate press release, the publisher, Social Bandit Media, rejected accusations that the children's book was "likely to incite hatred" against Israelis and "harm the moral development of young people". It also criticised what it described as a de facto censorship procedure against a publication that remains legal.
The raid also sparked widespread criticism across political, cultural and online communities, many of whom condemned the raid as an attack on freedom of expression.
Europe 2026: On 7 January, armed, masked French police and prosecutors raided feminist bookstore Violette & Co. in Paris to search for a children's coloring book titled "From the River to the Sea." Hatred of Palestinians is now France's state religion. pic.twitter.com/jbRWy7rit0
— Ali Abunimah (@AliAbunimah) January 18, 2026
Several elected officials pointed to what they see as a pattern of pressure on the bookshop, citing political attacks and vandalism last summer, attempts to cut its public funding and now a police search.
Online, many users expressed disbelief that police and prosecutors had been mobilised to look for a children’s colouring book, calling the scene "surreal" and deeply worrying for cultural freedoms.
Ça suffit ! La librairie "violette and co" a été perquisitionnée. Et la plainte qu'elle a déposée face aux menaces dont elle est la cible a disparu.
— David Belliard (@David_Belliard) January 16, 2026
Insupportable pression auprès des librairies indépendantes. Face aux attaques de la droite et des macronistes, mobilisons-nous ! pic.twitter.com/xdQSZwAWTt
Translation: Enough is enough! The bookshop "Violette and Co" has been raided. And the complaint it filed over the threats it has been facing has disappeared. Unbearable pressure on independent bookshops. In the face of attacks from the right and Macronists, let's mobilise!
Others denounced what they described as an authoritarian drift in French politics and the use of judicial tools to intimidate independent, politically engaged spaces.
"This is an unprecedented act in a cultural venue in France, and of extreme gravity," said Clemence Guette, deputy of the French National Assembly. "I express my support for the employees of the bookstore and I call for a wake-up: the anti-democratic and authoritarian drift of Macronism, particularly on the issue of the genocide in Palestine, is alarming."
L'obscénité répressive. « Violette and Co », ce n'est pas qu'une librairie : c'est vous et moi, c'est notre droit. Cinq flics et un substitut du procureur sont descendus chez nous tous, ce matin. https://t.co/eoLVZPrQ8j
— Léonard Vincent (@leonard_vincent) January 16, 2026
Translation: Repressive obscenity. "Violette and Co." isn't just a bookstore: it's you and me, it's our rights. Five cops and a deputy prosecutor came down to all of our homes this morning.
Some social media users linked the affair to broader legislative debates, notably the proposed "Yadan bill" on combating "renewed forms of antisemitism".
Critics of the draft law warn that it could further restrict freedom of expression, particularly around criticism of Israel and Israeli policy.
Some argued that the raid of Violette and Co demonstrates that such constraints are already being enforced.
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