Who can blame the French Jews for leaving France — or contemplating that — as they seem to do be doing?
Today’s report of an attack on a twenty-three year old woman (with her thriteen-month old baby) on a French train by knife-wielding “youths” (I am deliberarely using the euphemism often employed in the French press for North African gangs) cannot help things. They cut the hair and drew swastikas on the body of the woman, who was apparently not even Jewish.
If you’re interested in why I, a former Francophile, no longer care to live in France, you might consider one of the last graphs in the article:
Jean-Paul Huchon, president of the Ile-de-France region surrounding Paris, said it was vile and unacceptable to attack a defenseless woman and child and condemned that fact that other passengers did nothing to intervene.
Somehow I think, in this day and age, that wouldn’t happen here.
UPDATE: Last December, in the company of, among others, Nidra Poller, I rode the same train where this attack occurred, getting off at the same station as the attackers — Sarcelles. It is a double-decker train and I was told then by my companions to avoid the dangerous upper deck. I did. I don’t know where this attack took place.
MORE: Apparently, there are serious allegations that this event was a hoax. See the comments by Fausta below who has been monitoring the reporting on France 2.
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