Jean-Marie Le Pen, wife Jany
© AFP/Getty ImagesJean-Marie Le Pen's wife Jany (together) was violently attacked and robbed by a moped thug at a market in Paris over the weekend.
Jean-Marie Le Pen's wife was violently attacked and robbed by a moped thug at a market in Paris over the weekend. Jany, 86, was punched to the ground and battered with a motorcycle helmet by the man in the La Celle-Saint-Cloud suburb at around 1pm on Saturday.

The thief made off with her handbag on the back of a scooter after his getaway driver waited nearby. The thugs managed to withdraw £2,000 from Mrs Le Pen's credit cards before she could block them.

Mrs. Le Pen was hospitalised with bruising to her left elbow and neck pain after the attack.

Her husband, Jean-Marie, founder of France's far-right National Front party, praised his wife's 'courage and determination' in fighting off the mugger.

Mr. Le Pen served as President of the National Front from 1972 to 2011 and has been a Member of the European Parliament since 2004.

He was expelled from his own party by his daughter Marine in 2015 for controversial comments he made about the holocaust. She took over as leader in 2011 but was booted from the Front National for calling Nazi gas chambers a mere 'detail' of history.

A year earlier, he made a 'joke' in which he appeared to suggest that a popular French Jewish singer, Patrick Bruel, should be put into an oven.