The New France

Marie Brenner has written an article in Vanity Fair on France and anti-Semitism. It is very sad. Here are some sections.

Amedy Coulibaly, who had grown up in a Paris suburb with his Malian parents, attacked people in a Jewish delicatessen, the Hyper Cacher, in a quiet area in Porte de Vincennes. The day before, Coulibaly had killed a policewoman who was investigating a traffic accident in the suburb of Montrouge. He had at least one Kalashnikov rifle, a Scorpion submachine gun, two Tokarev pistols, knives, ammunition, and a silver laptop, with instructions on how to upload his footage and what to say to the news media. What he did not bring, however, was any equipment to make it work without Wi-Fi. The Hyper Cacher had no Wi-Fi. He held 19 people hostage, eventually massacred four people. He wore a GoPro video camera strapped to his torso to record the slaughter. He reportedly announced to his hostages: “I am Amedy Coulibaly, Malian and Muslim. I belong to the Islamic State.” He admitted that he had killed the policewoman in Montrouge and that he was working with Cherif and Said Kouachi, the brothers responsible for the Charlie Hebdo massacre. He said, ‘There are many people like me who are now preparing in Arab countries.’ He told others, ‘I am not crazy. We understand the Koran. We understand the good and the right way.’ He said, “Do you understand why I am doing what I am doing? Do you understand what I am doing here? I am here because the Prophet has given me an order. I am here to stop the war in the Arab countries.”
By the time the siege was over, four French Jews were dead, including one young man who grabbed a gun that Coulibaly had left on a counter because it had jammed. 

France has the largest population of Jews in Europe (and the third largest in the world, after Israel and the United States) and has always been seen as the laboratory to understand what is happening on the Continent. But Jews make up less than 1 percent of the French population. Even so, according to the S.P.C.J., they are the target of 51 percent of all racist acts in France. The country has become Israel’s biggest source of immigrants.

70% of French Jews are Sephardic Jews, the Jews of Spain, Portugal, North Africa and the Middle East and their descendants. The adjective "Sephardic" and corresponding nouns Sephardi (singular) and Sephardim (plural) are derived from the Hebrew word "Sepharad," which refers to Spain.

 “This is not the Paris of Woody Allen. That Paris no longer exists.”
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The base of the Statue de la République is defaced with a swastika as a protest in support of Palestinians turns anti-Semitic, Paris, July 26, 2014. By Etienne Laurent/EPA/Corbis.