Gaza war exacerbates hidden identity politics in France

Axe-wielding Algerian was recently arrested and the entrance of a synagogue was set ablaze, adding to tension in the country

Rima Hassan seen with the protesters during the Pro-Palestine demonstration march in Marseille, southern France. Sopa Images

Suppressed identity politics has burst into the open in France, a country that hosts Europe's largest Jewish and Muslim population, as attacks against French Jews increase in number and violence.

“Words like Jewish, Zionism and anti-Semitism are being used by different people with different intentions,” said Jewish human rights lawyer Arie Alimi. “There isn't enough education about what those words mean.”

France's social model, in which citizens are expected to be moulded by Republican values and keep religious beliefs private, is losing ground to the idea that ethnic or religious loyalties trump national ones, said co-director of the Observatory of Political Radicalism at the Jean-Jaures foundation, Jean-Yves Camus.

“There is a lack of understanding or desire to understand each other,” Mr Camus, a Jewish convert, told The National. “A climate of fear permeates the Jewish community, and fear isn't rational.”

Violence against Jews in France is not new and has long been associated to a rise in tensions between Israel and Palestinians.

But what is shocking to many is the sudden increase in the number of attacks, which reached an all-time high of 1,676 in 2023, in particular after the October 7 attacks against Israel – nearly four times more than in 2022.

Politicians have further exacerbated tensions by blaming each other for the toxic atmosphere.

The centre, right and far-right have pointed the finger at the biggest force among a new left-wing coalition, France Unbowed. Unlike other parties, it has taken a strong pro-Palestinian stance, in what is viewed as a strategy to gain Muslim votes.

It is a sensitive topic in a country that bans religious and ethnic data but France Unbowed's strategy appears to have worked, according to a recent poll which shows that 64 per cent of Muslims have a favourable view of party heavyweight Jean-Luc Melenchon.

That figure falls to 13 per cent among the general population in findings published by think-tank Ipsos for Le Monde, Sciences Po University's research center (CEVIPOF), the Montaigne Institute and the Jean Jaures Foundation.

France Unbowed says the real anti-Semites are among Marine Le Pen's far-right National Front, which has worked hard to rid that reputation from her party, founded in the 1970s by Nazi sympathisers.

But it got mired in controversy during a snap election in July due to comments made by candidates.

Axe attack

Racist attacks overall increased in 2023, according to the latest data published by France's National Consultative Commission on Human Rights. They include a 29 per cent increase in Islamophobic attacks. Expressions of other forms of racism, against Arabs, Black people, Asians, and other groups, rose by 21 per cent.

The election's result caused further headache after no clear majority emerged. President Emmanuel Macron nominated Prime Minister Michel Barnier on Thursday, 52 days after his predecessor Gabriel Attal resigned – the longest time France has gone without a functioning government since the establishment of the Fifth Republic in 1958.

When on August 24 when a keffiyeh-wearing 33-year-old Algerian man turned up before morning prayers at a synagogue in a La Grande-Motte, southern France, with an axe on which he had written references to Gaza, Palestine and the blood of Muslims, Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin was prompt to lay the blame on France Unbowed most prominent pro-Palestinian figure, recently elected European lawmaker Rima Hassan.

“What was terrible at La Grande Motte … was that the [attacker was waiting for the] rabbi with an axe,” Mr Darmanin told BFMTV last week.

Media reports claim that the suspect, named as El Hussein Khenfri, got the prayer time wrong. No one was there when he arrived at the synagogue, so he set fire to its entrance and several cars before fleeing on foot. He was arrested after a shoot-out with the police.

France's counter-terrorism prosecution office, which took over the probe for the first time in an anti-Semitic attack since October, said the suspect told policemen that he did not have murderous intentions but wanted to “get a reaction from Israeli authorities.” Voices calling for appeasement and dialogue have struggled to be heard.

When Mr Alimi cosigned an op-ed in June in daily Le Monde about the need to fight anti-Semitism from both the left and far-right, he was attacked by both sides for alleged racism or for seeming to want to excuse the left.

“Many left-wing parties don't understand the strong link with Israel developed by French Jews who arrived in the 1960s from North Africa,” said Mr Alimi, born in France of Tunisian and Algerian parents, who also wrote a book published in April about his experience as a left-wing Jewish intellectual in France after the October 7 attacks.

“They've stayed stuck in an anti-imperialist understanding of the conflict which views French Jews as divorced from Israel.”

Dangerous slurs

The person who has been the focus of most intense debate in France since the October 7 attacks is Ms Hassan, a 32-year old lawyer born in a refugee camp to Palestinian parents in Syria and who came to France as a child.

An articulate politician with a large following on social media, Ms Hassan's sharp criticism of Israel has been viewed as anti-Semitic by a wide range of politicians, particularly from Mr Macron's camp Renaissance.

They describe her good looks as hiding dark intentions of spreading Hamas' extremist Islamist ideology in France. Some also accuse her, without proof, of being close to Syrian President Bashar Al Assad.

Ms Hassan has rejected these accusations, describing them as “dangerous instrumentalisation” in an exchange with The National. “I work closely with anti-Zionist and decolonial Jewish movements,” she said. “Israelis are targeted for what they do, not for who they are.”

After the attack at La Grande Motte, Ms Hassan reposted a statement she had issued on October 10 calling on pro-Palestinian activists to avoid anti-Semitic tropes and not assimilate Jews to Israel. But such statements have done little to dispel accusations of anti-Semitism against the left.

Renaissance MP Caroline Yadan, who represents French people abroad in a number of southern European countries and Israel, has been particularly vocal in her attempts at forcing Ms Hassan, who she views as dangerous, out of politics.

Ms Yadan told The National she was on holiday last month when Ms Hassan attended a pro-Gaza rally in Amman during which pro-Hamas slogans were chanted.

She did not have her laptop with her, so reached out to colleagues on a WhatsApp group and convinced more than 50 MPs to sign a letter asking the Paris prosecutor to investigate Ms Hassan for incitement for racial hatred and apology of terrorism – accusations rejected by Ms Hassan, who said she cannot be held responsible for what others chant during protests she attends.

The group of MPs also asked European Parliament president Roberta Metsola to lift her immunity in the case of an investigation, despite being aware that this kind of request can only be lodged by a judicial authority, not politicians.

“At some point, when you're an MP, you have to take your responsibilities, and I think she's extremely dangerous,” Ms Yadan said of Ms Hassan. “We must do everything to stop her doing harm,” added Ms Yadan.

She described Ms Hassan's work with left-wing Jewish groups as unrepresentative – “99.9 per cent of Jews know how dangerous she is” – and said she should have left the Amman protest – “If you don't agree with what's being said, you leave.”

Ms Yadan also echoed Ms Darmanin's accusations against Ms Hassan encouraging anti-Semitic attacks. “What kills Jews in France are lies about Israel,” said Ms Yadan.

It's difficult to link statements made by Ms Hassan, or participation to pro-Palestinian movements, with attacks against Jews, particularly in the case at La Grande Motte, said Mr Camus, who cautioned against such shortcuts.

“I am very wary of those who link protests and violent acts,” he said. “Many are using the [Middle East] conflict as a political weapon. It's not good for Arabs, it's not good for Israel.”

What is most alarming for the Jewish community, Mr Camus said, is the feeling that France has not found the tools to deal with cycles of violence against them.

The number of attacks against Jews never went below 330 a year, after their number exploded after the Second Intifada in the early 2000s. In the late 1990s, they varied between 80 and 90 a year.

Recent traumatic events for the community include the killing of three Jewish children outside their school in Toulouse in 2012 by Mohammed Merah, born in France of Algerian parents.

“Most of my friends say: it's not that the government doesn't like us, but nothing changes,” said Mr Camus.

While some, like Ms Yadan, point at the “Islamisation” of French society, likely reasons that may explain why attacks against Jews never decreased to pre-2000 levels include anger at a lack of a political situation to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the increasing military pressure on Palestinians, said Mr Alimi.

“The real question is: what is the link between criticising Israel and anti-Semitism?” he asked.

The definition of anti-Semitism adopted by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s includes “holding Jews collectively responsible for actions of the state of Israel”. Yet there is a defensive mood among French Jews.

“French Jewish institutions are more and more sensitive to criticism against Israel, so when violent words are spoken, they feel they're directed against all Jews,” said Mr Alimi. “It's the same when you hear anti-Arab discourse from some politicians, which can cause a feeling of islamophobia among the French population. It's a similar phenomena”.

In his work as part of the Human Rights League NGO, Mr Alimi said he speaks to various political parties behind closed doors to bring down tensions.

“As soon as we notice misunderstandings or political statements that may be anti-Semitic, we try to create dialogue,” he said. “We need to put meaning back on words.”