These violent attacks have come from only a part of the press: the two left leaning weeklies, Marianne and Nouvel Observateur. These magazines have for a long time been hostile to CRIF and never miss an opportunity to say it is not representative, whereas CRIF does indeed represent a variety of opinions and institutions.
There are political reasons behind this, which have to do with Israel. Both these magazines have for many years been favourable to Jews who have been hostile to successive Israeli governments, although these governments are the democratic expression of Israeli society. They refuse to see that even the foremost pacifist figures in Israel itself have been adopting a stance that is now more security conscious and more reticent with regard to the peace process, and that those who live in France, who are the most virulent, only represent themselves.
The campaign in favour of Shlomo Sand’s book is but one example. This Israeli historian, who has no qualification to tackle the subject and is almost unknown in his country, but is violently anti-Zionist, has been billed by these journalists as representing “the other Israel”. Shlomo Sand says that the Jewish people do not exist. Such a phantasmagorical construction has its own logic: if the Jewish people do not exist, then CRIF, the non religious representative of Jews, doesn’t represent anything!
Positions have become more hard line since Israel’s new government has been in place, with easy criticism of its positions without ever listening to what it actually has to say.
But we should also not forget the Al Durrah case a while back, when these two news magazines distinguished themselves with an astonishing petition protesting against a decision by the Court of Appeals which had dismissed the claim of a journalist from the TV channel France 2 who had accused Philippe Karsenty of libel (Karsenty insists that the France 2 footage showing the shooting and death of young Muhammad Al Durrah in 2000 is a fake): people who adopt this kind of corporatist stance and criticise a court decision like this are hardly qualified to give lessons about judicial intrusion.
The second motive of these journalists is a rejection of “communitarism” (the term the French use to describe strong ethnic or religious identification): we all agree that this is to be rejected, but it is an easy and gratuitous accusation. Certainly, France must not become a juxtaposition of tribes who are more or less indifferent to the common good. But precisely what CRIF stands for, and I believe it is doing a good job, is to promote the values of the Republic, liberty, equality, secularism – together with the dream of fraternity.
Society today is no longer what it was in 1791 when these ideals were first defended, and the notion of identity and belonging has become less monolithic, more complex. It is no longer exclusive, as it was in the past. Identifying with both the Jewish and the French people is not a contradiction. And clearly, the law is the law of the country we live in.
The temptation of wanting to place expressions of belonging to the Jewish world on the same footing as Islamic fundamentalism and other anti-democratic and anti-republican movements, claiming they are all manifestations of “communitarism”, is a clear sign of politically correct myopia.
The attempt to leave anti-Semitism aside in this trial stems precisely from this state of affairs. While we shouldn’t go looking for anti-Semitism where it isn’t to be found, we cannot deny that a primary and potentially ferocious form of anti-Semitism has developed in recent years, and not only in France, against a backdrop of anti-Zionism that makes it no less worrying. I have always said that I was hoping that the appeal trial would be held in public, so as better to analyse the role played by anti-Semitism in this murder. Some would prefer to minimise it, including my admirable predecessor at the head of CRIF, Theo Klein. They fear that focusing too much on this factor may lead to a further hardening of relations by exacerbating “communautarism”.
I, on the other hand, believe that the Republic is strong enough to impose rules and bans.
I do not disapprove of people criticising CRIF: that is the vital price of democracy, and some criticisms can be extremely useful, when their intentions are not hostile out of hand. I’m surprised that, while they are not challenging the legitimacy of this or that professional or other association in expressing itself when its particular field is being challenged (be they farmers, doctors, teachers,…) these journalists refuse Jews the right to express their feelings when faced with a particularly abject anti-Semitic crime.
This is so inconceivable that I am obliged to think there are other underlying motivations, and that these motivations are political.
When you are accused of “feeding anti-Semitism”, what is your answer?
That’s a classic argument: don’t talk too loud because you’ll wake up the anti-Semites… This reminds me of what the French philosopher Gabriel Marcel said in 1946, when he told Jews, for their own good, to “moderate their claims”! Those days are behind us.
Together with other French citizens, and more dearly than most, we have earned the right of freedom of expression. If that is feeding anti-Semitism, then that means anti-Semitism continues to creep beneath the surface, so we might as well flush it out.
The trial of the murderers was held in camera. How could you therefore quote things that you did not hear?
That is precisely the problem of the in camera process. It was impossible to avoid the trial being held in camera because two of the accused, who were minors at the time of the events, had asked for it and for practical purposes the court did not wish to separate their case from that of the other accused. This crippled the whole trial.
Two questions were tormenting me: first, was it possible to try and draw lessons from the workings of this gang which might shed light on the reasons that can lead people to commit the most heinous deeds when caught up in a group? Secondly, was the problem of anti-Semitism dealt with in depth, when for circumstantial reasons anti-racist organisations were prevented from speaking in the case, as would have been normal?
From that point of view, the role of counsel for prosecution was particularly important. Like others, I was unable to obtain direct information and whatever information there was, however much it tallied, is admittedly questionable. But what else was there to do? I felt it was necessary, once the trial was over, to express my doubts and concerns about the way anti-Semitism had been dealt with during the proceedings.
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