I am just crossposting my comments made under Fran's articles, becaused I think it would be good to focus a thread on this issue.  (Sorry if this is against policy).

There has been little coverage in the American press until today's NY Times article.

Burning cars as a form of protest is not unusual in the largely immigrant, working-class neighborhoods. Unemployment rates there are 30 percent or more, while the national rate is 10 percent. More than 20,000 cars have been set ablaze in France so far this year, according to a government report cited by the newspaper Le Figaro.
The periodic violence highlights France's failure to integrate immigrants into the country's broader society, a problem that has grown in urgency as the unemployment rate climbs. Most of the country's immigrants are housed in government-subsidized apartments on the outskirts of industrial cities. They benefit from generous welfare programs, but the government's failure to provide jobs has created a sense of disenfranchisement among the young. A highly observant form of Islam has grown popular among the mostly Muslim population.

And just noting from the Guardian above:

Not for the first time, the unrest has highlighted tensions between wealthy big cities and their grim ghettoised banlieues, home to immigrants from the Maghreb and West Africa who have never been fully integrated into French society and have become an underclass for whom hopelessness and discrimination are normal.

I would appreciate any reference to background on these stories, so we have some context for them. I note whataboutbob raising this as an issue yesterday, and a few early questions also arising on the site.   Certainly there was awareness in America about issues with a growing Muslim population, but more around stories about how negative and Fascist La Pen is, and recent stories on banning Muslim headscarves in schools.  Are the above stories accurate on balance?