French student protests, which began in late September 2026, intensified on October 1–2 as high school and university students blockaded schools over teacher shortages, overcrowded classrooms, poor buildings and funding cuts. More than 1,000 schools were affected, with fires and clashes with police reported. Unions have called a nationwide day of protest for October 6.
In the above context, a 36-second video montage has gone viral on social media. In the first video, we can see overturned and vehicles burning on the street. In the second, we can see a crowd vandalising a bus station.
The video is being shared with a caption claiming that it shows the ongoing student protest in France.
A social media user shared the video with a caption that reads, “France is on fire. What started as school protests over overcrowded classrooms has turned into riots across the country. Schools have been set alight, cars and fire engines torched, and police beaten in the street. 5,000 people have been arrested since Monday. More than 300 police and security staff have been injured, and 100 schools have been badly damaged. The French government has lost control of its own country.”
SouthCheck found that the claim is false. We found that the viral video is from December 2022, showing the unrest that followed the deadly attack on the Kurdish Cultural Centre in Paris.
A Google reverse image search of the opening visuals led to the same footage posted on December 24, 2022, by French journalist Remy Buisine on his X account. Buisine reported the footage as showing “Chaos in the centre of Paris, vehicles overturned and set on fire. Clashes ongoing.”
The journalist had also shared other videos of the protest. One of the other videos of the same day suggests that it is of a Kurdish demonstration.
Keyword searches of the latter portion of the viral video were shared by a Turkish website, Yeni Safak, on December 25, 2022.
The caption read, “Supporters of the PKK terrorist organisation carried out acts of violence in Paris, the capital of France, under the pretext of protesting the armed attack that killed three people. Thousands of PKK supporters gathered in the Place de la République in Paris around 2 PM Turkish time. On Tremple Boulevard near the square, attackers chanted slogans in support of the PKK terrorist organisation and carried photographs of its leader Abdullah Öcalan and rags symbolising the PKK. The terrorist group's supporters also tore up paving stones and threw them at the police and nearby houses and shops.”
Since both videos are not recent, we can ascertain that they are not of the student protest in 2026.
Moreover, taking a hint, we searched with relevant keywords and found that the incident was also reported by a French website on December 23, 2022.
According to the report, the Parisian Kurdish community was dealt a devastating blow when a man opened fire near the Ahmet-Kaya Kurdish Cultural Centre in Paris’s 10th arrondissement, killing three people. That same evening, clashes erupted between Kurdish demonstrators and police, some of whom were deployed in the area to provide security for Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin's visit. The following day, further confrontations broke out on the sidelines of a march that had departed from the Place de la République.
Hence, we can ascertain that the viral claim is false.
