On January 13, after the mass demonstrations in which millions waved tri-colored flags and chanted the Marseillaise, a poll found 87 percent of the French saying they were “feeling proud” of being French. Yet, writes Michel Gurfinkiel, “near unanimity is not unanimity.”

What soon became apparent was that only the Old French (the culturally European and Judeo-Christian French) took part in the vigils and marches and were delighted to be together, whereas most New French (the culturally non-European and non-Judeo-Christian immigrant communities) stood aside.

Most imams issued perfunctory condemnation of terrorism, but were clearly unenthusiastic about Charlie Hebdo’s right to make fun of [Islam]. Even more ominously, one-minute-of-silence ceremonies at school were met with hostility and scorn by Muslim children and teenagers from third grade to high school. . . . Many people or groups associated with Charlie Hebdo were threatened on the Internet. In the Lyons area, a Jewish jeweler’s shop was vandalized.

In other words, the ethnic and religious polarization that has befallen France over the past years is growing into an ever more explicit conflict. And this is no small business.

This week, there have been numerous unconfirmed reports about the fate of Esmail Qaani, who is the head of the Quds Force, the expeditionary arm of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards. Benny Avni writes:

On Thursday, Sky News Arabic reported that Mr. Qaani was rushed to a hospital after suffering a heart attack. He became [the Quds Force] commander in 2020, after an American drone strike killed his predecessor, Qassem Suleimani. The unit oversees the Islamic Republic’s various Mideast proxies, as well as the exporting of the Iranian revolution to the region and beyond.

The Sky News report attempts to put to rest earlier claims that Mr. Qaani was killed at Beirut. It follows several reports asserting he has been arrested and interrogated at Tehran over suspicion that he, or a top lieutenant, leaked information to Israel. Five days ago, the Arabic-language al-Arabiya network reported that Mr. Qaani “is under surveillance and isolation, following the Israeli assassinations of prominent Iranian leaders.”

Iranians are desperately scrambling to plug possible leaks that gave Israel precise intelligence to conduct pinpoint strikes against Hizballah commanders. . . . “I find it hard to believe that Qaani was compromised,” an Iran watcher at Tel Aviv University’s Institute for National Security Studies, Beni Sabti, tells the Sun. Perhaps one or more of [Qaani’s] top aides have been recruited by Israel, he says, adding that “psychological warfare” could well be stoking the rumor mill.

If so, prominent Iranians seem to be exacerbating the internal turmoil by alleging that the country’s security apparatus has been infiltrated.