Sétif and Guelma Massacre
The Sétif and Guelma massacre (also called the Sétif, Guelma and Kherrata massacres or the massacres of 8 May 1945) was a series of massacres by French colonial authorities and pied-noir European settler militias on Algerian civilians in May and June 1945 around the towns of Sétif and Guelma in French Algeria.
In response to French police firing on demonstrators during a protest in Sétif on 8 May 1945, native Algerians rioted in the town and attacked French settlers (colons) in the surrounding countryside, killing 102 people. The French colonial authorities and European settlers retaliated by killing thousands of Algerian Muslims in the region with estimates varying widely. The initial estimate given by French authorities was 1,020 killed, while the current Algerian government cites an estimate of 45,000 killed. Estimates by historians range from 3,000 to 30,000 Algerian Muslims killed. The massacre marked a turning point in Franco-Algerian relations, ultimately leading to the Algerian War of independence from 1954 to 1962.
