LAST week's events in Paris were about power. The intentional killing of unarmed civilians is always about power: unaccountable, amoral, fascistic power.

There are no moral distinctions between intentionally murdering creative cartoonists in Paris and intentionally blowing up civilian hospitals in Gaza.

Self-titled 'religious' terrorists and self-righteous state terrorists may sit at different levels on the spectrum of unaccountable power. But make no mistake: they both occupy the same fascist spectrum. And they both cynically abuse virtuous values to justify unaccountable actions in pursuit of unchallengeable power.

That's partly why mainstream political and media discourse rapidly (and lazily) framed last week's events within the narrow safety of two neatly related narratives.

The first narrative is that the murderous outrage against Charlie Hebdo was about attacking 'freedom of the press' - a code for 'western' democratic values.

That's absolutely true. The actual attack was about silencing intellectual satire with physical violence. It was a hammer of obtuse brutality crushing a voice of creative democracy.

The second narrative is that last week's events are another example of Islamic (and anti-Semitic) terrorism striking the heart of 'our' western democracies with ferocious religious fanaticism.

That's also true. There is undoubtedly an extreme form of non-state international terrorism claiming flawed allegiance to Islamic teaching. It is anathema to the greatness and goodness of most followers of Islam - lots of whom live in Ireland.

But neither of those twin narratives fully explains the past week in Paris. It wasn't just about 'Islamic terrorist fanatics attacking wholesome western democracy'.

And once you reach that conclusion; once you rationally delve deeper into such complex events, then you're obliged to start asking much bigger questions.

Questioning the mainstream narrative isn't a betrayal of Charlie Hebdo's values.

Rather, it's an homage to that vision which has spoken truth to power (however controversially in the past).

Dozens of world leaders and diplomats attended Sunday's memorial in Paris: yet how many of their states have ever murderously attacked oppositional media offices or journalists? In their 'resource wars'? In their colonies? In the Baltics? The Occupied Palestinian Territories? Asia and Africa? Central and Latin America?

When was the last time world leaders from those states marched to memoralise any similarly outrageous attack by one of their own 'club' against democratic free speech?

Is it not blindingly hypocritical that such state-sponsored terrorism has never inspired a similar consensus of state-led outrage?

And is that wilful hypocrisy not - in some sense - exploitable by the very fascists aiming to destroy this generation's efforts at building democracy?

These questions (and more) raise uncomfortable answers for anyone framing events in a neatly narrow political/security narrative.

They illuminate the global gulf that divides citizens' aspirations for progressive values from the corrupt actions of many powers - state and non-state.

France's historic values of liberty, equality, fraternity, collectivism, and social separation of church and state, represent the ideological pantheon of practical republicanism and ethical communism.

On Sunday world leaders sought to associate with those historic French values (though not their originating communist roots). And that's why they brazenly descended on Paris.

It wasn't about simply facing down violent fascists who, on this occasion, claimed the convenient flag of Islam.

It was about selfish symbolism and public positioning - domestic and international.

It was about relegitimising an elite consensus of security power under the battered banner of Western neo-liberalism; and cynically seizing on millions of grieving French marching for unity.

On Sunday world leaders ignored the inconvenient truth of 20th century European fascism: Mussolini and his Black Shirts in Italy; Hitler and his Brown Shirts in Germany; Franco and his Falangists (and his bishops) in Spain; O'Duffy and his Blueshirts in Ireland. And the inconvenient truth is that the indigenous and enduring challenges against European fascism erupted - not from capitalists or conservatives - but from republican resistance and communist partisans, many of whom were Jews. (The editorial leadership of Charlie Hebdo also came from a communist tradition.) Fascism today remains the amoral exercise of unaccountable power in any guide or circumstance. It abuses whatever flag of convenience fits: 'Islam'; 'Christianity'; 'democracy'; 'security'; 'interventionism'; 'nationalism'.

The moral panic from last week's fascist violence will now justify additional infringements of fundamental rights and extra resources for security agencies. Already, 10,000 armed troops on French streets; new privacy invasion laws planned in Britain.

A non-state agenda attacking Charlie Hebdo's basic freedom of speech will be cynically exploited by a statist agenda further restricting European freedoms. The irony is palpable. And frightening.

Championing accountable democracy means challenging both agendas. j.kearney@irishnews.com