March 14, 2002	Thursday	Zilhaj 29, 1422

PARIS: The Union of Jewish Students of France (UEJF) has published a white paper which lists 405 “anti-Jewish acts” that the UEJF claims occurred in France during the 17 months between Sept 1, 2000, and Jan 31, 2002.

The document, officially titled — Le Livre blanc des actes antisemites — was released on March 12, and updates a list of 312 “incidents of anti-Semitism,” that was published in Tel Aviv in January by Rabbi Michael Malchior, Vice Minister for Foreign Affairs, whose attacks against France were recently amplified by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.

At the time, Rabbi Malchior accused France of “not taking seriously” the incidents, and “hesitating” about taking action to bring them to a halt.

Rabbi Malchior has also characterized France as “the worst country in the West for the number of incidents of anti- Semitism.”

In the most recent listing of the so-called anti-Semitic acts, the UEJF says that many of the acts were linked with the start of the second Intifada, such as attempted burning of French synagogues. A second wave, the white paper points out, came about with the Sept 11 attacks on the United States, which notably have taken the form of “insults” and “anti-Semitic graffiti.”

The report also claims that “the majority of the acts are committed by young people who originate from the Maghreb countries of Africa who identify themselves with the combat of the Palestinians.”

Although one of the authors of the report, UJEF president Patrick Klugman, says that all ethnic references were purposely “suppressed” from the report, “so as not to stigmatize” France’s Islamic population, it is evident that the lion’s share of the incidents are being blamed on France’s young Muslims.

Indeed, Prime Minister Sharon, in following up earlier this year on Rabbi Malchior’s original report, placed the blame squarely on the back of France’s Islamic population, when he observed that “700,000 French Jews have to face a dangerous wave of anti-Semitism” brought about by the existence of “six million Arabs.”

The white paper is being published jointly with SOS-Racisme, an anti-racist association established 20 years ago by the French Socialist Party, whose titular head at the time was Lionel Jospin, the present prime minister and presidential candidate.

Jospin is known to be “increasingly annoyed,” according to a member of his entourage, about the accusations made by Israel about French anti-Semitism, for until now he has very visibly stayed out of the debate over the anti-Semitism issue, preferring, evidently to not ruffle his Israeli supporters, notably Prime Minister Sharon who, during an official visit to France last Summer, made it very clear that “Jospin is our friend, whereas Chirac is not our enemy.”

But, given the traditional ties that link Jospin’s Socialist Party to Foreign Minister Shimon Peres and the Israeli Left, Jospin has felt it necessarily in recent days to go on the record and express his disagreement with Sharon’s policies.

To the point where the editor of the Jerusalem Post International, Amotz Asa-El, felt obliged this week to write an “open letter” to Jospin in the pages of French daily Le Figaro, telling the French Prime Minister that he, Jospin, “does not possess the moral authority with which to pass judgment on the tactics of Sharon.”

The attack on Jospin, the first time he is criticized publicly by Israel, coincides with the arrival in Paris of Rabbi Malchior himself, who is being sent to France in an attempt to “explain” Franco-Israeli bilateral relations.

Rabbi Malchior will be making a much awaited speech on March 14 before the Paris-based foreign press club, during which he will be speaking on “bilateral relations between France and Israel” as well as the “present situation of and the perspectives for peace in the Middle East.”

The Vice Minister is also making the presentation in his capacity as president of an Israeli forum that “coordinates the fight against anti-Semitism.”

A presence which has resulted in off-the-record comments by French leaders of all political stripes who accuse Israel of “meddling” in internal French affairs, indeed in attempting to put Franco-Israeli relations at the center of the French presidential campaign.

Although French authorities have not yet officially reacted to publication of the UEJF white paper on French anti-Semitism, and to the visit to France of Rabbi Malchior, French political sources say they are “scandalized” at the timing of the new initiative, especially, as it comes “right in the middle of a presidential election campaign.”

“Even President George W Bush,” point out the sources, “decided to put off his own official visit to France until late May.”

Although incumbent Jacques Chirac has attempted to do like Jospin and avoid taking a public stand on Franco-Israeli relations, the French president did react with anger on Feb 26 when confronted with charges by Sharon that France had become an anti-Semitic country.

In light of the accusations, Chirac decided to send a high- level delegation to Israel with the mission of refuting Israeli claims that France has become a “hotbed” of anti-Semitism.

If Chirac has felt personally hurt by the charges of anti- Semitism, it is because it was he, upon arriving in office in 1995, who became the first French president to recognize that France had an “imprescriptible debt” towards the 76,000 Jews who, according to Kalfon, were spoiliated of their belongings in 1940-44.