Alain Soral

On 15 April 2019, after years of regular prosecutions and financial condemnations for his declarations, he was sentenced to a year in prison for Holocaust denial as a result of a drawing published on Egalité et Réconciliation, a parody of a Charlie Hebdo cover which made fun of the Rwandan genocide. Arguing that he was not the author of the drawing, and that the drawing was merely showcasing strong black humor in the same vein as the satirical journal, without actually expressing negationist views, Soral stated that this was a demonstration of the double standard regarding the freedom of speech when it comes to the Jewish community, and of the persecution it entails, therefore validating the "serious" of his struggle, for it means that the powers that be are "taking [him] seriously."

He then published another polemical essay, Vers la féminisation? – Démontage d'un complot antidémocratique ("Towards feminisation? – Analysis of an antidemocratic plot"), and spent the following couple of years writing and directing his first full-length movie, Confession d'un dragueur ("Confessions of a womaniser"), which was a commercial and critical failure. Disgusted by what he called "a lynching", Soral gave up cinema altogether and returned to writing. He published Jusqu'où va-t-on descendre? – Abécédaire de la bêtise ambiante ("How far down are we going? – ABC's of ambient stupidity"), followed by Socrate à Saint-Tropez (2003) and Misères du désir (2004).

His latest essay Comprendre l'Empire: Demain la gouvernance mondiale ou la Révolte des nations (Understanding the Empire: Tomorrow global governance or an uprising of nations) was published in France on 10 February 2011.

Soral was typically a communist, influenced by Karl Marx or Georges Sorel and later worked for the National Front before leaving in 2009. In 2007 he founded his own political association, Égalité & Réconciliation (Equality and Reconciliation). At the same time he also launched a publishing company, KontreKulture, which he uses to publish contemporary controversial authors and to reissue out of print public domain books, that he believes are of historical importance.

In 2007 he became part of the central committee of Front National, trying to place social issues and even elements of marxist analysis in the program of the party (historically strongly opposed to Communism); but this proved to misfire as the score of candidate Jean-Marie Le Pen at the 2007 election turned out to be significantly inferior to his 2002 breakthrough as second round finalist. He left the party in 2009.

On 18 November 2007, Soral joined the central committee of the National Front, which he left in early 2009 because of some ideas he was in conflict with—especially the "menace of Islam", which he does not believe to be a genuine threat. He considers that this supposed threat is instrumentalized by establishment's interests for the purpose of fostering animosity between social groups to manipulate them within the model of identity politics, possibly resulting in a "clash of civilizations", and of looting other countries—Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Syria; he argues that the fundamental values of moderate Islam are perfectly compatible with French moderate Catholic ones.

In 2007, he founded the group Égalité et Réconciliation, a think tank led by the ideas he developed in his books and his numerous video interviews broadcast on the Internet, an innovative mix between social and economic ideas from the Left, and values like family, nation, morality from the Right.

In 2005, Soral turned to the far-right, joining the National Front's campaign committee; he was given responsibility for social issues and for the suburbs under the authority of Marine Le Pen. Soral's personal journey has led some to compare him with Jacques Doriot, one of the neo-socialists in the early 1930s and Collaborationist under Pétain. He supported the Bloc identitaire's distribution of food in January 2006.

In a 2005 interview given to the magazine VSD, Soral announced his intellectual support for the equally controversial Dieudonné M'bala M'bala, with whom he worked on the Euro-Palestine list for the European elections of 2004, before his withdrawal led Dieudonné to do likewise.

On February 10, 2005 a criminal court in Paris sentenced Alain Sorrell to a fine of 10,000 euros in respect of racist insults against the journalist Frédéric Haziza, for a parody song he sang to the tune of Daniel Balavoine's L'Aziza. During the hearing, Haziza declared that he fell victim to threats and insults on Alain Soral's website after he refused to invite him to one of his television programs. In addition to the fine, the author was to pay 5,000 euros as compensation to Frederic Haziza, 3,000 euros for court expenses and 1,000 euros for legal expenses to four racism combat organizations.

He now lives in the Pyrenees-Atlantiques. Since June 2004, he has been a boxing coach.

In a report on the television program Complément d'enquête, broadcast on the French television channel France 2 on 20 September 2004 (in its episode devoted to the controversial French humorist Dieudonné M'bala M'bala following the beginning of his radicalization), being interrogated while Dieudonné is visible in the background, nodding in approval, Alain Soral said:

Around that time, Soral had joined the French Communist Party. He became interested in the works of Karl Marx and other Marxist thinkers such as Georg Lukács, Henri Wallon, Lucien Goldmann and Michel Clouscard. He published Sociologie du dragueur ("Sociology of the womaniser"), his most successful sociological essay to date. This book was later turned into a feature-length film, Confession d'un Dragueur in 2001 starring Said Taghmaoui, Thomas Dutronc, Catherine Lachens, Francois Levantal and Cloe Lambert

Soral performed in Catherine Breillat's 1996 film Parfait Amour! in the role of Philippe.

Soral defined himself as a Marxist, and was a member of the French Communist Party in the early 1990s. He left the PCF because of his opposition to the party's renunciation of revolutionary content. Soral supported left-wing dissident candidate Jean-Pierre Chevènement during the 2002 presidential election.

Alain Soral, identified in the civil registry as Alain Bonnet, and frequently also named using the full family name as Alain Bonnet de Soral (French: [alɛ̃ sɔʁal] ; born 2 October 1958), is a Franco-Swiss ideologue also known for his work as author, journalist, essayist, and film maker;

Soral further argues that communitarianism in France could have a similar effect, if the French Republic fails to apply 1905 Law of Separation of Church and State, which is enshrined in the French constitution. According to a recent TV interview (Direct 8 / 88 minutes), Alain Soral stated: "Today, no one was surprised to see French presidents, prime ministers and other high French political figures meet elusively with the Jewish representing body every year in Paris, meetings that go against the laws of France and send mixed signals to the Republic."