La Haine opens with news footage of urban riots in a banlieue in the commune of Chanteloup-les-Vignes near Paris, caused by the attack and hospitalization of Abdel Ichacha, leading to an attack on the police station and a riot police officer losing his revolver. The film depicts approximately twenty consecutive hours in the lives of three friends of Abdel, all young men from immigrant families, living in the aftermath of the riot.