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French Jews Sound Alarm Following Far-Left Surge in Elections; France-Israel Relations Expected to Plummet
Jean-Luc Melenchon, leader of La France Insoumise party, speaks after the results of the second round of the 2024 French legislative elections, at the headquarters of La France Insoumise, July 7, 2024. Photo: Victoria Valdivia / Hans Lucas via Reuters Connect
Following a shocking election in France that brought a leftist coalition to power, French Jews are expressing deep apprehension about their future status in a country that in recent months has experienced a historic surge in antisemitism and souring relations with Israel.
Over the weekend, France’s coalition of far-left parties, the New Popular Front (NFP), won 182 seats in snap parliamentary elections, delivering a blow to Marine Le Pen’s far-right National Rally party (RN), which was expected to perform better. However, NFP failed to obtain a majority of the 577 seats in France’s National Assembly, meaning it will need to build alliances with other parties in order to pass legislation.
French President Emmanuel Macron’s centrist Ensemble alliance now has the second largest faction with 163 seats. The RN and its allies won 143 seats, garnering the third biggest representation.
The largest member of the NFP is the far-left La France Insoumise (“France Unbowed”) party, whose leader, Jean-Luc Melenchon, has styled himself as the self-appointed leader of the coalition. His new position of power has French Jews worried.
“Melenchon is a person who is a threat against the Jews,” Yonathan Arfi, president of the Representative Council of Jewish Institutions of France (CRIF), told the Jerusalem Post after the voting on Sunday. He added that La France Insoumise (LFI) puts “a target on the back of all Jews who support Israel.”
Arfi also blasted LFI on X/Twitter, writing that it “has no place in government,” pledging to fight “its culture of violence and its antisemitic excesses.”
Shortly after the NFP’s victory, Melenchon called for France to recognize a Palestinian state, and supporters of the hard-left coalition, which includes socialist and communist parties, poured into the streets of Paris waving Palestinian flags. French flags were largely absent from the celebrations.
Melenchon in a 2017 speech referred to the French Jewish community as “an arrogant minority that lectures to the rest.”
Three years later, Melenchon suggested that Jews killed Jesus, echoing a false claim that was used to justify antisemitic violence and discrimination throughout the Middle Ages in Europe. “I don’t know if Jesus was on a cross, but he was apparently put there by his own people,” he said in an interview with a French TV station. He refused to apologize even after backlash from notable Jewish groups.
In the wake of the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas’ massacre across Israel on Oct. 7, Melenchon and his party issued a statement declaring the attacks “an armed offensive of Palestinian forces” as a result of continued Israeli “occupation.” Melenchon also failed to condemn a deputy who called Hamas a “resistance movement.”
As the NFP prepares to wield greater influence in the legislature, French Jews have expressed concern over what they expect to be even more hostility than what they have been facing.
“It seems France has no future for Jews,” Rabbi Moshe Sebbag of Paris’ Grand Synagogue told the Times of Israel following the ascension of the NFP. “We fear for the future of our children.”
Meanwhile, Jewish French intellectual Bernard-Henri Levy counseled in a post on X/Twitter, “Pray that Macron does not call on Melenchon [to become the next president] under any circumstances. Urge the social democrats to break their pact with this antisemite.”
NFP’s victory came amid a record surge of antisemitism in France in the wake of the Hamas atrocities of Oct. 7. Antisemitic outrages rose by over 1,000 percent in the final three months of 2023 compared with the previous year, with over 1,200 incidents reported — greater than the total number of incidents in France for the previous three years combined.
Late last month, an elderly Jewish woman was attacked in a Paris suburb by two assailants who punched her in the face, pushed her to the ground, and kicked her while hurling antisemitic slurs, including “dirty Jew, this is what you deserve.”
In another egregious attack that has garnered international headlines, a 12-year-old Jewish girl was raped by three Muslim boys in a different Paris suburb on June 15. The child told investigators that the assailants called her a “dirty Jew” and hurled other antisemitic comments at her during the attack. In response to the incident, Macron denounced the “scourge of antisemitism” plaguing French society.
Now with the ascension of the far left, French Jews fear even an even greater spike in antisemitic violence. In an interview with The National — a UAE-based publication — a French Jew who requested only to be identified by his first name warned against the violence coming from France’s extreme left: “There is an urgent need to stop the far left, which has allied itself with radical Muslims — if we don’t stop it France will become even more dangerous for Jews.”
In addition to an expected increase in antisemitism, Israel-France relations are expected to nosedive, following comments by the incoming coalition. NFP has publicly called for the recognition of a Palestinian state and a break “with the guilty support of the French government for the far-right supremacist government of [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu to impose an immediate ceasefire in Gaza and enforce the order of the ICJ [International Court of Justice].” The ICJ is considering an ongoing case brought by South Africa accusing Israel of committing “state-led genocide” in its defensive war against Hamas in Gaza.
The NFP coalition’s platform also demands that Israel release all “Palestinian political prisoners,” many of whom have been imprisoned for terrorism offenses.
Under the Macron government, Israel became increasingly isolated from France. Last month, French officials banned Israeli arms manufacturers from attending Europe’s largest arms exposition, Eurosatory, citing Israel’s ongoing operations in Gaza.
The NFP coalition will likely seek to block arms sales to Israel as demands for a ceasefire grow.
Meanwhile, on Monday, France’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs released a statement condemning what it described as “colonization in the Occupied Palestinian Territories.”
Although Melenchon has called for Macron to step down, the incumbent president announced that he will remain in office until his term ends in 2027.
The post French Jews Sound Alarm Following Far-Left Surge in Elections; France-Israel Relations Expected to Plummet first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Washington Warns UK, France Against Recognizing Palestinian Statehood

Britain’s Foreign Secretary David Lammy leaves Downing Street, following the results of the election, in London, Britain, July 5, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Toby Melville
i24 News – The United States has warned the UK and France not to unilaterally recognize a Palestinian state at a UN conference scheduled for June 17 in New York, the Middle East Eye reported Tuesday.
France and Saudi Arabia will co-host this conference on the two-state solution, with Paris reportedly preparing to unilaterally recognize Palestine. France is also pressuring London to follow this path, according to sources from the British Foreign Office.
French media reports indicate that French authorities believe they have the agreement of the British government. Meanwhile, Arab states are encouraging this move, measuring the success of the conference by the recognitions obtained.
This initiative deeply divides Western allies. If France and the UK were to carry out this recognition, they would become the first G7 nations to take this step, causing a “political earthquake” according to observers, given their historical ties with Israel. The Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer threatened last week to annex parts of the West Bank if this recognition took place, according to a report in the Israeli newspaper Haaretz.
In the United Kingdom, Foreign Secretary David Lammy publicly opposes unilateral recognition, stating that London would only recognize a Palestinian state when we know that it is going to happen and that it is in view.
However, pressure is mounting within the Labour Party. MP Uma Kumaran, member of the Foreign Affairs Committee, said that the government was elected on a platform that promised to recognize Palestine as a step towards a just and lasting peace. Chris Doyle, director of the Council for Arab-British Understanding, believes that there is no legitimate reason for the United States to interfere in a sovereign decision of recognition, while highlighting the unpredictability of US President Donald Trump on this issue.
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Police, Shin Bet Thwart Suspected Iranian Attempt Perpetrate Terror Attack

A small number of Jewish worshipers pray during the priestly blessing, a traditional prayer which usually attracts thousands of worshipers at the Western Wall on the holiday of Passover during 2020, amid the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak, in Jerusalem’s Old City, April 12, 2020. Photo: Reuters / Ronen Zvulun.
i24 News – The Shin Bet security agency and Israel Police thwarted another Iranian attempt to recruit Israelis, according to a statement on Tuesday, arresting a resident of East Jerusalem for allegedly carrying out missions for the Islamic Republic.
Iranian agents recruited the suspect, who in turn recruited members of his family. He is a resident of the Isawiya neighborhood in his 30s, and is accused of maintaining contact with a hostile foreign entity to harm the state by carrying out a terrorist attack against Jews.
The suspect had already begun perpetrating acts of sabotage and espionage, including collecting intelligence about areas in Jerusalem, including the Western Wall and Mahane Yehuda Market. He also hung signs, burned Israeli army uniforms, and more in exchange for payment totaling thousands of shekels.
He was also charged with planning a terror attack in central Israel, including setting fire to a forest, and was told to transfer weapons to terrorist elements in the West Bank.
The suspect’s sought the help of family members, including his mother. A search at his home revealed sums of cash, a spray can used in some of his activities, airsoft guns, suspected illegal drugs, and more.
His indictment is expected to be filed by the Jerusalem District Attorney’s Office.
The statement said that the case is yet another example of Iranian efforts to recruit Israelis. “We will continue to coordinate efforts to thwart terrorism and terrorist elements, including those operating outside Israel, while attempting to mobilize local elements in order to protect the citizens of the State of Israel,” the Shin Bet and Police said.
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Pro-Russian, Anti-Israeli Hackers Pose Biggest Cybercrime Threats in Germany

German Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt holds a chart showing the development of antisemitic crime, during a press conference on Figures for Politically Motivated Crime in the Country, in Berlin, Germany, May 20, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Lisi Niesner
Cybercrime in Germany rose to a record level last year, driven by hacker attacks from pro-Russian and anti-Israeli groups, the BKA Federal Crime Office reported on Tuesday as the government said it would boost countermeasures to combat it.
“Cybercrime is an increasing threat to our security,” said Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt. “It is getting more aggressive but our counter-strategies are also becoming more professional,” he said.
Some 131,391 cases of cybercrime took place in Germany last year and a further 201,877 cases were committed from abroad or an unknown location, a BKA report said.
The actors behind the hacker attacks on German targets were primarily either pro-Russian or anti-Israeli, said the BKA, adding targets were mostly public and federal institutions.
Ransomware, when criminals copy and encrypt data, is one of the main threats, said the BKA, with 950 companies and institutes reporting cases in 2024.
German digital association Bitkom said damage caused by cyberattacks here totaled 178.6 billion euros ($203.87 billion) last year, some 30.4 billion euros more than in the previous year.
Dobrindt said the government planned to extend the legal capabilities authorities could use to combat cybercrime and set higher security standards for companies.
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