Anti-Jewish violence leaves Europe on edge, Arab youths blamed for many of attacks

SF Gate News ^ | April 24 2002 | Elizabeth Bryant, Chronicle Foreign Service

[knighthawk]

Strasbourg, France -- The Great Jewish Cemetery curls like a wave of tranquillity around the edge of this bustling university city, its lawns clipped, its tombs well tended.

But it takes only a few minutes to find the ugliness.

Past two Holocaust memorials lies a long line of gravestones, each emblazoned with a freshly daubed Nazi swastika.

[knighthawk]

Ping

[knighthawk]

WILL EUROPE FIGHT FEAR?
NY Post, 24 April

Police officials in Berlin were forced to beat a hasty retreat yesterday after publicly suggesting that Jews should stop wearing religious symbols in order to avoid anti-Semitic attacks.

The department expressed "great regret if ill feeling has been caused."

Indeed.

At a time of growing European anti-Semitism, police officials have no business suggesting that potential victims hide their identities.

Yes, there's a historical irony at work: In the 20th century, a German government demanded that Jews publicly identify themselves by wearing religious symbols on their clothes.

Now, a German government briefly suggested the opposite.

But though perhaps well-intentioned, the "hide your Jewishness" proposal points to a greater problem: what appears to be a disturbing lack of will to fight these mounting attacks, the worst in Europe since the Nazi era.

Jews and other should be free to wear whatever symbols they please - in public. The first obligation of government is to protect that right - and not by urging the victims to cower in fear.

[TopQuark]

Police say the prime suspects in many of the attacks are angry, disenfranchised Arab youths of North African origin.

Note how the leftists always insert this word to promote their Marxist view of the world: these youths may be angry, they may be Arab, but if they only had jobs --- they would not have done this.

Garbage. These "youths" are indoctrinated with hate and idea of Muslim superiority; they act out of malice, plain and simple.

[gaspar]

Angry "disenfranchised" Arabs making trouble? Whatsamadda, don't they get enough unemployment pay? France is a sick, sad joke. Yeah, yeah, I know, so what else is new?

[knighthawk]

Here in the Netherlands 60% of the Moroccans are unemployed, even though there is a shortage of workers.

[Joe Boucher]

It's called the protestant work ethic. Just watch how different groups work. Old time Cubans in Florida work their butts off, the ones that came over before Castro. The ones that have fled Cuba after the revolution are worthless. Hand out for a free anything, slackers when it comes to work.

I have seen the industrious Jews and they work their butts off. North Africans, yeah I find it hard to believe they would keep their noses to the grind. Jamacians I wouldn't hire one, too interested in leaning against something. Hang in there Israel, the majority of Americans are behind ya. Keep your powder dry.

[monkeywrench]

There are more and more of these types of articles posted, but, there is never any mention of any arrests. Is anyone being arrested?

[KayEyeDoubleDee]

Heightening the concern are Sunday's stunning presidential election results, in which extreme right candidate Jean-Marie Le Pen placed second. Although Le Pen will almost certainly lose a May 5 runoff vote against conservative President Jacques Chirac, his first-round showing is unprecedented in modern French history for a fringe candidate. An Israeli official told Radio France Monday that Le Pen's victory confirmed allegations of anti-Semitism in France raised previously by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon. Le Pen has called the Holocaust a "detail of history."

I don't know much about this Le Pen dude. Is he the anti-semite they portray in this article?

[knighthawk]

I heard in France some arrests were made. But I don't know anything about real sentences yet.

[knighthawk]

It's hard to say. He made this and some other comments in the past, but recently he changed. Unlike Chirac, he blamed the Arabs for the attacks on Jews and strongly condemned these attacks. Also he claims that since he married his wife his attitude towards Jews changed because his wife has many Jewish friends. Only time will tell if it is true.

[blam]

If I were Jewish, I'd quietly start selling out and then leave France. That's what the 'lucky' one did in Germany, early.