Lis sur mes lèvres!

From Matt Ludlam:

Matthew Dalton and  Noemie Bisserbe report at the Wall Street Journal:

French President Emmanuel Macron delayed a planned tax increase on fuel, handing a victory to a grass-roots protest movement that has massed across France to challenge his agenda.

Faced with another weekend of destructive protests by the “gilets jaunes”—or yellow vests—Prime Minister Édouard Philippe told a news conference Tuesday the tax hike would be pushed back six months. The worst riots to hit Paris in decades erupted during antigovernment protests Saturday, leaving the city’s shopping and tourist center dotted with burning cars and broken storefronts. Protesters vandalized the Arc de Triomphe, rattling Mr. Macron’s administration and the nation.

“No tax is worth threatening the unity of the nation,” Mr. Philippe said.

The protests have become a test of Mr. Macron’s resolve to forge ahead with his broader agenda, particularly his pro-business overhaul of the French economy. Tuesday’s concession marked the first time the Macron government has blinked since the former investment banker took office in the spring of 2017.

The French leader has eschewed the consensus-building approach of his predecessors. Instead he wielded his executive powers and his large majority in Parliament to defy the political opposition, unions and other groups as he stripped away job protections and wealth taxes that help underpin France’s social model.

In recent months, however, Mr. Macron’s approval ratings have plummeted and lawmakers in his own party have begun calling on him to display flexibility as the gilets jaunes protests have piled up. Polls show that more than 70% of the public supports the gilets jaunes.