The French colonized Algeria in 1830 and Algeria was under the protectorate of France for over a century. At first things were all smooth as the Algerians were trying to adapt to the French way of life simulating to their way of day to day living, but things were not as good as they sounded to be. With time, the French was noticed to be unfair and denying the Algerians most of their rights. As the country was seen as a province of France, it was held under the laws of France the constitution was to apply in this province as they termed it.
This was never the case; French colonialism in Algeria as seen through the movie was not as favorable and interesting as any other country that was colonized. The French is seen to torture the Algerians in many cases whenever they do an offense and not treating them as their citizens. There was no jail term for most of the offenders in Algeria as they were killed on the spot for their crimes. Others were executed once they were convicted by the law courts which were not fair to them as the Judges and the juries were French.
It can be noted that the Algerians were also denied most of their civil liberties by the French rulers. The French did not allow most of the Muslim Algerians to vote during an election, and most public offices were out of their bounds. The Muslims Algerians are seen not to be given full freedom of worship as they are always under watch, and some of their practices were forbidden by the French government. This sparked various uprisings by the Algerians leading to retaliation by bombing major cities in France in order for the government to hear their pleas.
With this type of rule by the French, it was expected for uprisings and revolts to take place soon. The Algerians did retaliate in various ways; there were several protests in the streets by the various Algerians who saw that there were rights were being denied. To them, they did not understand how they could be treated as slaves in their own country by foreigners, they tried to cry for audience by the government but these always fell on deaf years but they were usually ignored. This led to the various revolts and use of force by the Algerians.
The Algerians could be seen sending their women to various French markets armed with explosives and bombing these areas so as to air their grievances. This led to various operations by the government as they tried to capture the organizers behind these killings. The rebels never gave up on their missions as one rebel group emerged followed by the other. This increased the number of deaths of the Algerians as they continued their fight with the French government. These resulted in increased number of refugees escaping the capital over the period of years as they went to seek refuge in other countries. There was a notable increase in street protest over the years and demonstration in Algiers as the people demanded for independence which they eventually got.
Works Cited
"Battle of Algiers, English subtitles." YouTube. N.p., 19 Sept. 2012. Web. 23 Jan. 2014.
Morgan, Ted. My Battle of Algiers: A Memoir. New York: Smithsonian Books/Collins, 2010. Print.
