- Karim Benzema files defamation suit against Interior Minister Darmanin, denying alleged links to the Muslim Brotherhood.
- The legal challenge claims political exploitation by Darmanin, emphasizing Benzema’s clean record and the damage caused to his reputation.
French football star Karim Benzema has filed a defamation suit against the country’s interior minister, Gérald Darmanin, after the minister said he had “notorious” links with the Muslim Brotherhood.
In a legal challenge viewed by AFP, Benzema accused the minister of leveraging the player for political gain, stating that Benzema “has never had the slightest link with the Muslim Brotherhood organisation, nor to [his] knowledge with anyone who claims to be a member of it.”
The minister initiated criticism against Benzema, 36, in mid-October, following the former Real Madrid player’s expression of solidarity with the people of Gaza on social media. “Our prayers to the people of Gaza, victims once again of unjust bombardments that spare neither women nor children,” he wrote on X.
Darmanin, perceived as a hardliner within his party, asserted in a French conservative broadcast, “Benzema is notoriously linked with the Muslim Brotherhood, we all know it.” He provided no evidence to support his claims.
Days later, after Benzema denied the allegations and threatened legal reprisals, Darmanin resisted calls in an interview with BFMTV to provide proof. He instead pointed to the fact that the player had not tweeted in support of the Israelis killed in Hamas’s 7 October attacks or the French teacher stabbed to death by a former pupil in Arras, describing his interviewers as being naive.
Benzema filed the legal challenge on Tuesday, stating that the minister’s remarks “undermine” the player’s honour and reputation. The Muslim Brotherhood is an organisation prohibited in numerous nations.
In the 92-page complaint, Benzema, a practicing Muslim who now plays for the Al-Ittihad club in Saudi Arabia and who has previously won the Ballon d’Or, added: “I am aware of the extent to which, because of my notoriety, I am being used in political games, which are all the more scandalous given that the dramatic events since 7 October deserve something quite different from this type of statement.”
Benzema’s legal counsel, Hugues Vigier, characterized the minister’s statement as out of line. “It’s the exact opposite of what a man who calls himself a politician should be working towards,” he told the French broadcaster RTL.
He further stated that Darmanin’s remarks were “sowing division in France, with lots of people who don’t understand this kind of talk, some who exclude Karim Benzema and some who feel excluded by what is being said about him.”
