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Antisemitism on the Rise: A First Person Account of Being a Jew in France
French President Emmanuel Macron at a ceremony in Paris to commemorate French victims of the Oct. 7 Hamas pogrom in Israel. Photo: Reuters/Gonzalo Fuentes
My friend, Marc, lives in a medium-sized city in France with a medium-sized Jewish community. He considers himself a “medium” Jew. He wears a Star of David necklace, but not a kippah. On Friday nights, his family gathers for Shabbat dinner and lights candles, but they watch TV afterwards. He goes to synagogue for bar and bat mitzvahs, but otherwise prefers to relax at home on Saturday mornings. He usually goes to Israel once a year for celebrations with family members who live in the north of the country — it’s a quick and inexpensive flight from France. He has two nephews and one niece serving in the Israeli military right now.
Since October 7, his life has changed because of antisemitism. Not “grab-the-suitcase” changed, but profoundly and pervasively changed.
Antisemitic incidents and terror attacks have plagued France for two decades, but it was different before. The antisemitism Marc knew was the horror of hearing about Islamist terrorists killing Jews at a Jewish school or at a kosher store. Attacks on the street seemed mostly to happen to Jews who lived in “bad” neighborhoods. Marc knew people who knew individuals who had been assaulted, but the worst his family had experienced was the time a car of young men drove in front of his synagogue and yelled, “F— the Jews.”
After October 7, Marc is no longer just a “medium” Jew. Now he’s a “stop-and-think” Jew.
Now he sees “Death to Zionists” graffiti on the street near his synagogue, which causes him to stop and think. He knows the synagogue is safe, because it’s protected by police and the Jewish community’s own security. But he’s heard about Jews in other cities who were assaulted on their way to synagogue, and he knows the police can’t be everywhere. He read that antisemitic incidents in France increased by 10 times from October through December. He stops and thinks: Is there a safer route to the synagogue, even if it’s a little longer?
Marc won’t take off his Star of David necklace. But before he leaves home, he stops to think whether he remembered to tuck it into his shirt. Why take the chance of having a total stranger yell at you that you’re a child killer?
Marc wonders what his acquaintances really think of him. He has been surprised to hear people accusing Israel of genocide, even in his presence, when they know he has family there and visits often. They don’t know his nephews and niece are in the IDF, and he would never mention that.
Spring break is coming up, and Marc stops and thinks about the decision to send his kids to university in France, not Israel. They have called several times to talk about their uneasiness when they hear calls for Israel’s destruction at the anti-Israel demonstrations on their campuses. His kids don’t fear for their safety, but they do worry for their people.
Only when he is in the company of other Jews at a Shabbat dinner, is he able to truly relax. He can let his guard down and not worry about any of the multiple ways antisemitism has permeated his life.
Marc stops and thinks about the article his friend recently sent. In December, the leaders of the Belgian Jewish community wrote an op-ed in a major Brussels paper, where they stated the choice before Europe’s Jews after October 7 was “between emigrating to Israel, a country without antisemitism but at war, or remaining in countries at peace but increasingly more hostile to Jews.” Not long ago, Marc read that immigration applications to Israel by French Jews were up 430%.
It is decision time for Marc. If he no longer stops to think, but decides to leave, that will signal the beginning of the end of mainstream Jewish life in Europe. The “medium” Jews like Marc make up the majority of those who affiliate with Jewish communities in Europe and sustain their institutions.
Many European leaders have said that Europe will not be Europe without its Jews. Now is the time for European governments to take decisive action against antisemitism to avoid that fate. They need to set a public tone of zero tolerance for antisemitism. They need to instruct police and prosecutors to enforce the laws. They need to take administrative actions available to them to ensure that Jews can live openly and freely as equal citizens.
Europe’s leaders need to stop and think, because after October 7, it’s decision time for Europe’s Jews.
Andrew Srulevitch is Director of European Affairs at the Anti-Defamation League.
The post Antisemitism on the Rise: A First Person Account of Being a Jew in France first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Germany: 5 Killed, Scores Wounded after Saudi Man Plows Car Into Christmas crowd
Magdeburg Christmas market, December 21, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Christian Mang
i24 News – A suspected terrorist plowed a vehicle into a crowd at a Christmas market in the German city of Magdeburg, west of the capital Berlin, killing at least five and injuring dozens more.
Local police confirmed that the suspect was a Saudi national born in 1974 and acting alone.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz expressed his concern about the incident, saying that “reports from Magdeburg suggest something bad. My thoughts are with the victims and their families.”
Police declined to give casualty numbers, confirming only a large-scale operation at the market, where people had gathered to celebrate in the days leading up to the Christmas holidays.
The post Germany: 5 Killed, Scores Wounded after Saudi Man Plows Car Into Christmas crowd first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Syria’s New Rulers Name HTS Commander as Defense Minister
A person waves a flag adopted by the new Syrian rulers, as people gather during a celebration called by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) near the Umayyad Mosque, after the ousting of Syria’s Bashar al-Assad, in Damascus, Syria, Photo: December 20, 2024. REUTERS/Ammar Awad/File Photo
Syria’s new rulers have appointed Murhaf Abu Qasra, a leading figure in the insurgency which toppled Bashar al-Assad, as defense minister in the interim government, an official source said on Saturday.
Abu Qasra, who is also known by the nom de guerre Abu Hassan 600, is a senior figure in the Islamist Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) group which led the campaign that ousted Assad this month. He led numerous military operations during Syria’s revolution, the source said.
Syria’s de facto leader Ahmed al-Sharaa discussed “the form of the military institution in the new Syria” during a meeting with armed factions on Saturday, state news agency SANA reported.
Abu Qasra during the meeting sat next to Sharaa, also known by the nom de guerre Abu Mohammed al-Golani, photos published by SANA showed.
Prime Minister Mohammed al-Bashir said this week that the defense ministry would be restructured using former rebel factions and officers who defected from Assad’s army.
Bashir, who formerly led an HTS-affiliated administration in the northwestern province of Idlib, has said he will lead a three-month transitional government. The new administration has not declared plans for what will happen after that.
Earlier on Saturday, the ruling General Command named Asaad Hassan al-Shibani as foreign minister, SANA said. A source in the new administration told Reuters that this step “comes in response to the aspirations of the Syrian people to establish international relations that bring peace and stability.”
Shibani, a 37-year-old graduate of Damascus University, previously led the political department of the rebels’ Idlib government, the General Command said.
Sharaa’s group was part of al Qaeda until he broke ties in 2016. It had been confined to Idlib for years until going on the offensive in late November, sweeping through the cities of western Syria and into Damascus as the army melted away.
Sharaa has met with a number of international envoys this week. He has said his primary focus is on reconstruction and achieving economic development and that he is not interested in engaging in any new conflicts.
Syrian rebels seized control of Damascus on Dec. 8, forcing Assad to flee after more than 13 years of civil war and ending his family’s decades-long rule.
Washington designated Sharaa a terrorist in 2013, saying al Qaeda in Iraq had tasked him with overthrowing Assad’s rule and establishing Islamic sharia law in Syria. US officials said on Friday that Washington would remove a $10 million bounty on his head.
The war has killed hundreds of thousands of people, caused one of the biggest refugee crises of modern times and left cities bombed to rubble and the economy hollowed out by global sanctions.
The post Syria’s New Rulers Name HTS Commander as Defense Minister first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Sweden Ends Funding for UNRWA, Pledges to Seek Other Aid Channels
View of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) building in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip. Photo: Abed Rahim Khatib / Flash90.
i24 News – Sweden will no longer fund the U.N. refugee agency for Palestinians (UNRWA) and will instead provide humanitarian assistance to Gaza via other channels, the Scandinavian country said on Friday.
The decision comes on the heels of multiple revelations regarding the agency’s employees’ involvement in the October 7, 2023, Hamas-led massacre in southern Israel that triggered the war in Gaza.
Sweden’s decision was in response to the Israeli ban, as it will make channeling aid via the agency more difficult, the country’s aid minister, Benjamin Dousa, said.
“Large parts of UNRWA’s operations in Gaza are either going to be severely weakened or completely impossible,” Dousa said. “For the government, the most important thing is that support gets through.”
The Palestinian embassy in Stockholm said in a statement: “We reject the idea of finding alternatives to UNRWA, which has a special mandate to provide services to Palestinian refugees.”
Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Sharren Haskel thanked Dousa for a meeting they had this week and for Sweden’s decision to drop its support for UNRWA.
“There are worthy and viable alternatives for humanitarian aid, and I appreciate the willingness to listen and adopt a different approach,” she said.
The post Sweden Ends Funding for UNRWA, Pledges to Seek Other Aid Channels first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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