PARIS: France will firmly combat antisemitism, President Emmanuel Macron said on Wednesday, pointing to a surge in incidents of hatred against Jews since the attack by Hamas on Israel on Oct. 7 and subsequent fighting in the Gaza Strip.
There have been 1,159 antisemitic acts in France since Oct. 7, Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin said earlier on Wednesday, more than three times the number of such acts in 2022.
Those acts include spray-painting swastikas or stars of David on walls, but also insults and assault, Darmanin said, amid a global surge in antisemitic acts.
“Antisemitism is resurfacing, in words, on the walls,” Macron said in a speech. “The Republic does not and will not compromise, and we will be ruthless against those who carry that hatred.”
France is home to Europe’s largest Jewish and Muslim communities and conflicts in the Middle East tend to lead to tensions there.
French prosecutors opened a probe last week over a video showing a group of youths’ antisemitic chants.
Prosecutors are also investigating whether two Moldovans who admitted to daubing Stars of David on the walls of Parisian properties did so at the behest of someone abroad.
Europe 1 radio said last week that an individual in Russia had directed the operation. Le Monde daily spoke of pro-Russian bots spreading pictures on social media. Police and the interior ministry said they could not comment on this.
In France, as elsewhere in Europe, the Israel-Hamas war is splitting left-wing parties and beyond.
A march against antisemitism planned for Sunday by the heads of both houses of parliament has left parties divided on whether to attend, after the far-right National Rally said it would take part.
Macron says France will be ‘ruthless’ against antisemitism
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Macron says France will be ‘ruthless’ against antisemitism
- There have been 1,159 antisemitic acts in France since Oct. 7, Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin said
- Those acts include spray-painting swastikas or stars of David on walls, but also insults and assault
UN chief calls on Israel to reverse NGOs ban in Gaza
- In November, authorities in Gaza said more than 70,000 people had been killed there since the war broke out
- Israel on Thursday suspended 37 foreign humanitarian organizations from accessing the Gaza Strip after they had refused to share lists of their Palestinian employees with government officials
UNITED NATIONS, United States: UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres called on Friday for Israel to end a ban on humanitarian agencies that provided aid in Gaza, saying he was “deeply concerned” at the development.
Guterres “calls for this measure to be reversed, stressing that international non-governmental organizations are indispensable to life-saving humanitarian work and that the suspension risks undermining the fragile progress made during the ceasefire,” his spokesperson Stephane Dujarric said in a statement.
“This recent action will further exacerbate the humanitarian crisis facing Palestinians,” he added.
Israel on Thursday suspended 37 foreign humanitarian organizations from accessing the Gaza Strip after they had refused to share lists of their Palestinian employees with government officials.
The ban includes Doctors Without Borders (MSF), which has 1,200 staff members in the Palestinian territories — the majority of whom are in Gaza.
NGOs included in the ban have been ordered to cease their operations by March 1.
Several NGOS have said the requirements contravene international humanitarian law or endanger their independence.
Israel says the new regulation aims to prevent bodies it accuses of supporting terrorism from operating in the Palestinian territories.
On Thursday, 18 Israel-based left-wing NGOs denounced the decision to ban their international peers, saying “the new registration framework violates core humanitarian principles of independence and neutrality.”
A fragile ceasefire has been in place since October, following a deadly war waged by Israel in response to Hamas’s unprecedented October 7, 2023, attack on Israel.
In November, authorities in Gaza said more than 70,000 people had been killed there since the war broke out.
Nearly 80 percent of buildings in Gaza have been destroyed or damaged by the war, according to UN data, leaving infrastructure decimated.
About 1.5 million of Gaza’s more than two million residents have lost their homes, said Amjad Al-Shawa, director of the Palestinian NGO Network in Gaza.
