Why I didn’t sing La Marseillaise last night

When Patrice Evra and the French national football team lined up at Wembley last night, it was a moment of poignant defiance which earned an instant place in sporting iconography. I shed a tear, but I didn’t sing La Marseillaise.

When horrendous things like the attacks on Paris happen, our first instincts are to offer solidarity and what help we can. And, yes, to hit back. The night after the attack, France launched 20 separate air strikes on what it said were Isis strongholds in Syria. And at home, an extra 115,000 gendarmes were deployed across France, leading to hundreds of raids with dozens of arrests.  In the days following attacks on the West, there’s often a security snatch and grab, and this time was no different. The British government announced 1,900 extra secret service personnel and extra funding. Cameron, in his sternest voice, said the attacks ‘strengthen the case for military action in Syria’ and said that we needed increased surveillance.