From one viewpoint, if the a/c was airworthy it could glide quite a ways, but to what end? Over the open sea there is no reason to forestall the inevitable contact with water. Give it time to configure with pilot selected drag for water landing. If it was airworthy and making power, try for diversion. If compromised structurally or power wise, and a water landing was inevitable, life vests would have been donned. If even an unsuccessful ditch, some would likely have survived, but there were no bodies with water in lungs. Multiple Tx would have been made, some signal sent.
If the BEA are correct and a/c was intact until hitting the water, the 'forte acceleration' would most likely have claimed all souls. As has been stated, the BEA's position just smells a little like an informed guess, a little different take on the data. Not as egregious as "It was Lightning", and also not as unbelievable as "they almost made it". I think the tailcone hitting first to disrupt the VS attachments is as good a theory as any. There is no real reason to believe the BEA would "shade" their comments, but neither would one expect them to aggressively push a position (absent good data) that would paint anyone in a bad way. Too many times, however, when "all reasonable doubt" is impossible to remove, it is the flightcrew that ends up holding the bag.
It isn't unreasonable to say that given the originating party, and a need to give the press something, AF looked at the ITCZ, ABI looked at the pilots, (and pitots), the pilots looked at the pitots, everybody looks at ACARS, and truth be told, I am avoiding looking at the pilots.