French far-left feminist apologises for calling mother's rape threat 'collateral damage' — but insists it had nothing to do with protests

Bettina Zourli was confronted by a mother who said a rioter threatened to rape her. The woman had been at home with her child and tried to stop looters ransacking the shop beneath her flat. Zourli is a gender studies graduate who backs Jean-Luc Melenchon's La France Insoumise and runs sociology workshops at Rennes 2 University. She told the distraught woman: 'It's collateral damage.'

Presidential candidate Gabriel Attal, of the Renaissance party, condemned her on Instagram.

Zourli now calls her words 'shocking' but says the threat had nothing to do with the October 17 mobilisation.

Last weekend's unrest saw 3,000 shops ransacked and almost 1,000 police officers injured.