There is a movie titlled Riffifi that was almost remade with Al Pacino. The original movie was based on a novel with he criminals all Arabs. It was a portrait of Paris crime scene in the 1950's. The filmmakers did not want. a backlash or accusations of prejudice, so they changed all the robbers into Frenchmen. Based on the book being as it was back then, I would assume they had strong organized crime groups of Arabs back in those days.