Skip to comments.
French Nazi hunter encourages Jews to leave France [Serge Klarsfeld ]
Jerusalem Post ^
| 6-20-04
| ETGAR LEFKOVITS
Posted on 06/20/2004 6:20:26 AM PDT by SJackson
Six decades after the end of the Holocaust, the prominent French Nazi-hunter Serge Klarsfeld said this weekend that French Jews would be best off leaving the country.
"One of the lessons of the Holocaust is that even if you want to fight against a wave of anti-Semitism, the best [thing] is to leave if you can," Klarsfeld said in an interview with The Jerusalem Post during a visit to Israel.
At the same time, Klarsfeld, who lives in Paris, said that he does not expect there be a great wave of Jewish emigration from France to either Israel or the US because most French Jews are well off.
While clearly differentiating between the rise of Nazi power in the late 1930s and the situation in France today, Klarsfeld drew a direct parallel to the Holocaust, stating that history has proven it would have been best "had the Jews of Poland and the Jews of Austria left Europe when they could have."
Klarsfeld's remarks come on the heels of reports that the Jewish Agency was planning to launch a campaign to persuade French Jews to immigrate to Israel to escape a wave of anti-Semitism.
The French government reported earlier this month that it had recorded 180 incidents of attacks or threats against Jews or Jewish-owned property since the start of this year, attributed to an increasingly violent second- and third-generation Muslim population.
With six million Muslims and 600,000 Jews, France has both the largest Muslim and Jews populations in Europe.
Although the numbers fell last year, over 2,500 French Jews immigrated to Israel in 2002, double the number a year earlier and the most since 1967.
Klarsfeld, 68, escaped deportation to the death camps by hiding in a closet; he spent the decades following the war in Paris as the leading Nazi hunter in France.
In the interview, Klarsfeld said that, if anything, French Jews who were thinking of immigrating would likely prefer moving to the US, instead of to an Israel engulfed in nearly four years of Palestinian violence. He noted that the father of a French Jew stabbed by a Muslim assailant in Paris earlier this month told the French prime minister that he was going to ask the US Embassy for "political asylum" for his family.
In a bleak assessment of the future of French Jewry, the Nazi hunter said tensions between Muslims and Jews in France were only likely to get worse in the years ahead. "There will be an escalation of attacks [against Jews] in Europe, and especially in France," he predicted.
Klarsfeld noted that anti-Semitic attacks have been aggravated both by the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian conflict which reaches the homes of French Muslims by inflammatory Mideast Arab TV stations accessible by satellite as well as by a French foreign policy, which Klarsfeld defines as "openly pro-Arab," and "years and years" of French public and media support for the Palestinian cause.
He added that while a quarter century ago, the bulk of Arab attacks against Jews in Europe came from terror emanating from the Middle East, the fear today is from radical Arab elements within Europe itself.
With a conflict that shows no signs of ending anytime soon, Klarsfeld opined that "things cannot improve" for the Jews living in France.
Klarsfeld, whose father died in Auschwitz, survived the Hollocaust along with his mother and sisters. After the war, his mother sent him to an all-Christian boarding school in a small city just outside Paris, where, as a boy of 12, Klarsfeld recalls ditching school to go to a shop where newspapers telling of the establishment of the State of Israel were sold.
The short-lived, close relationship between France and Israel following the War of Independence until the Six Day War stemmed from troubles France was having with the Arabs at the time and not out of a real friendship with Israel, Klarsfeld said. "France was always anti-Zionist," he said.
Although he later would work on a kibbutz and came to Israel as a volunteer in the 1967 Six Day War, Klarsfeld concedes that with a very French education, which included the study of French Latin and Greek and literally no Jewish culture, he felt more at ease in France than anywhere else, which explains his decision not to live in Israel despite the Israeli citizenship he holds.
While Klarsfeld has made France his home, his 38-year-old son Arno, an attorney by profession, was in the news recently due to his decision to come to Israel to do an eight-month volunteer stint in the army. He is currently serving in the border police.
Over the last few years, Klarsfeld has been active in pressuring the Hungarian government to search for lists of hundreds of thousands of Hungarian Jews deported and then killed by Nazis during the waning days of World War II.
Under mounting pressure, the Hungarian government earlier this month decided to establish a historical committee together with Yad Vashem to search for the long-sought lists, which Klarsfeld says (a Hungarian government report notwithstanding) he is certain were not destroyed.
Together with his wife, Beate, the Paris-based Klarsfeld has published similar lists of Jews deported from France and Belgium over the last decades.
TOPICS: Editorial; Foreign Affairs
KEYWORDS: authoritarian; france; frenchjews; intolerant; islam; israel; jacqueschirac; judeophobia; morewhining; muslims; sergeklarsfeld; terror; totalitarian
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-20, 21-35 last
To: thierrya
I'd love to help the French.
The problem is that Western countries refuse to face the cancer in their midst. A few thousand Muslim immigrants can be assimiliated. A few million are not assimilatable. They become a radicalized underclass prone to socialist economics and Islamist policies.
France is only in the later stages of the disease.
21
posted on
06/20/2004 6:36:21 PM PDT
by
rmlew
(Peaceniks and isolationists are objectively pro-Terrorist)
To: thierrya
I know it is very difficult, and I feel terrible it is happening to what was the birthplace of freedom in Continental Europe. What makes it worse is the deliberate setting of the stage by the French (an other European governments) for this to happen. The same stage is being set here in America by the Left.
The stage was set in Europe (and will be here) as follows:
1. Socialism permeates society. Socialists (Nationalists/Marxist/Greens) take over all levels of government and media. This allows them to not only control laws from the top (very precarious position), but also control "lower" ordnances in towns and cities, Foreign and Interior Ministries, etc. You can change the President or Prime-Minister, but the inner workings of the gov't remain the same socialistic tyranny. The "career" bureaucrats can easily hold up any attempt to return freedom and responsibility to the people. To the US FReeper: Sound Familiar? This is what President Bush has to deal with hourly. This is why the largest source of sabotage of the War on Terrorism may just be our own State Dept. This is also why the Dems block judges, appointments, and legislate from the judicial bench as their power comes not from the people they claim to "represent" but from the laws and red-tape of the unelectable portions of government they have permeated at the grass-roots level.
2. Use the power of the media to ostracize, lampoon, attack, discredit, etc ANYONE who even thinks of disagreeing with the socialists (Mikey Moore does this very well in the US, but he has legions of other "usefull idiots" allied with him).
3. Segregate religion from everyday life and secularize everything possible. Separate morals and ethics from the teachings of Christian/Jewish religion. Do everything possible to create situational ethics or other fuzzy logic nonsense. Replace God and the Church with the State and its "programs". Though do everything possible to promote cults, dark arts, and non-western religions. Example: Please tell me where in the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, or its Amendments does it say "separation of Church and State". I have yet to find it, yet the American media tells me it's there. But if it IS there, then why are several schools in the US forcing kids to recite the Koran and pray to Allah?
4. Infect educational institutions with socialism and stamp out any speech that questions it. Brainwash students with anti-western distortions and outright lies. Convince them every non-Western culture is superior to them and they are responsible for all the woe in the world.
5. Disarm the population. Begin with "sensible gun laws" and continue the incremental disarmament until only the police, military, and criminals/terrorists remain armed. Employ the media and educational institutions to attack, report, "investigate", slander, lie about, etc any positive aspect of an armed citizenry. France and America need to remember how many lives were lost in our respective revolutions against tyrannical rulers. Though I don't know about the French Revolution, I do know there were attempts by the colonial British government to disarm the American Colonists before our war.
This is only a partial list, but it is occurring all over. We are seeing the result of Leftist rule: Terrorism, Hate, Tyranny, Racism, and the coming of a second holocaust. Will we see Europe engulfed in the flames of hatred again in our lifetimes? I think so. How can we help those in Europe now? Aside from moral support, I don't know. I do know we must wake up sooner than our grandparents did and see the evil forming before it's too late.
Unfortunately Thierrya, I think you have seen far more of this hatred forming in your country than even the news we see here shows. My advice is save money, prepare as best you can with escape routes from your town and country, safe houses for Jews (and Christians since they are next) for those who will stay behind and help others, weapons are problematic in Europe (unless you're an Islamic terrorist in Europe, THEY seem very well armed!!) and I do not wish armed confrontations as, unless everything does go down the tubes, these would only succeed in killing those you love and lionizing the Islamic terrorist and anti-semite. But basically do anything else you can do to protect yourself and your friends and family. From all indications, the danger you face is real and will only get worse as the Islamofascists spread their hatred with the aid of European Socialism.
If what I am saying sounds radical, it is only the very same thing the French Resistance did in WWII and several groups did prior to WWII. How close are we now to WWIII? When will the "refugee" camps for Jews open after another "night of Broken Glass"? When will they start coming for Christians, Conservatives, and anyone else opposed to their racism, hate, and tyranny?
22
posted on
06/20/2004 8:32:24 PM PDT
by
M1Tanker
(Proven Daily: Modern "progressive" liberalism is just NAZIism without the "twisted cross")
To: M1Tanker
"How close are we now to WWIII?"
I think its already started annd many are too foolish to see. We will let history decide.
23
posted on
06/20/2004 9:28:04 PM PDT
by
priceofreedom
(On A Roadmap To Hell)
To: Caipirabob
"Christians and Jews must unite in this battle if we are to hope to survive."
Christ will come again but next time it may not be the way people imagine.
To: Caipirabob
Okay, how do you fight this? It's not like Muslims are members of a separate nation state, they're everywhere.
The only alternative that my simple mind can see is civil war.
25
posted on
06/20/2004 9:40:22 PM PDT
by
O.C. - Old Cracker
(When the cracker gets old, you wind up with Old Cracker. - O.C.)
To: SJackson
26
posted on
06/21/2004 2:15:56 AM PDT
by
lainde
(Heads up...We're coming and we've got tongue blades!!)
To: M1Tanker
Thank you very much for your advice.
Here we're trying to get ready for the worst.
27
posted on
06/21/2004 2:48:15 AM PDT
by
thierrya
To: priceofreedom
I think you are correct. WWIII has started, and it turns out it is just a continuation of WWII. We are fighting the same hatred and fascism, but now we are surrounded by it through the Western Leftist ideology, their support of terroism and hatred of freedom instead of just dealing with it 3000 miles away from the US Coast as our grandparents did.
28
posted on
06/21/2004 4:57:24 AM PDT
by
M1Tanker
(Proven Daily: Modern "progressive" liberalism is just NAZIism without the "twisted cross")
To: thierrya
My prayers and hope goes to you. I am also a soldier, and when the facade of civilization shatters in Europe, I will be there as soon as possible. I took an oath to protect the innocent, and if no one else will, I'll die alone trying. This hatred, socialist tyranny, and "final solution" madness has to be stopped. I prefer without bloodshed and suffering, but I think we are well past that mark...Even though the media certainly will do everything possible to hide that fact.
29
posted on
06/21/2004 5:05:53 AM PDT
by
M1Tanker
(Proven Daily: Modern "progressive" liberalism is just NAZIism without the "twisted cross")
To: M1Tanker
Thank you so much again.
I just wanted to tell you that every single day a jewish kid is verbally abused, molested, beaten etc.. in the schools of France.
Some christians too..
Best regards
30
posted on
06/21/2004 5:16:33 AM PDT
by
thierrya
To: M1Tanker
The coalition of the left and Islam is the new vanguard of revolutionary ideology and violence. What is happening in France adumbrates what will arrive shortly on the college campuses here. It goes without saying that the fuse is lit in Europe and Jews have until about the end of the decade to leave most of Europe (there are exceptions: Denmark, for example). As Europe sinks into a new dark age, America again will become the principal refuge for its victims.
To: SJackson
I've got a better idea.
The Jews have been in France for centuries. The Muslims have just recently arrived.
How about the Muslims go back to where they came from?
32
posted on
06/21/2004 6:08:40 AM PDT
by
Gritty
("Believe me, behind closed doors, there are no moderate Muslims"-Abu Musa)
To: Balding_Eagle
I don't think we'd want that. THey'd come over and vote for Demoncrats.
33
posted on
06/21/2004 6:12:28 AM PDT
by
nmh
(Intelligent people recognize Intelligent Design (God).)
To: M1Tanker
You are right! We are working up to a history repeat.
What galls me is that American Jews here are leading the parade for that state. Most are very liberal here. They vote accordingly (Demoncrats) and what they are doing is replicating the conditions you list. If ANY, and I mean ANY group should be opposed to liberalism and it's so nothing agenda as Hitler reincarnated takes control, you'd think it would be the Jews to be opposed to this but it is the opposite. They can't usher it in fast enough.
34
posted on
06/21/2004 6:16:19 AM PDT
by
nmh
(Intelligent people recognize Intelligent Design (God).)
To: Gritty
I've got a better idea...The Jews have been in France for centuries. The Muslims have just recently arrived...How about the Muslims go back to where they came from?If 21st century Frenchmen agree, that's essentially what will happen, or they'll become civilized Muslim Frenchmen. That doesn't appear to be the path France is taking however.
35
posted on
06/21/2004 8:35:08 AM PDT
by
SJackson
(They're not Americans. They're just journalists, Col George Connell, USMC)
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-20, 21-35 last
Disclaimer:
Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual
posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its
management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the
exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson