Paris under a gray winter sky does not see the morning light
until 8:00 a.m., and nightfall is here by 5:00 p.m. The air is
chill and damp. Still Paris is supremely beautiful, the cheeriness
of more clement seasons being replaced by the cheeriness of
Christmas decorations everywhere and Beaujolais Nouveau. A few days
in Paris at this time of year are as memorable as “April in Paris,”
though as I sat in the Café Flore, sipping espresso and
reading of the blasé French response to terror and the
weapons of mass destruction the old line echoed through my mind
about how grand France is except for the presence of the
French.
Actually the French have gotten much nicer over the past two or
three decades. Yet some of the unpleasant facets of the French
remain. They are among the most reluctant of our allies to support
us in war against Saddam Hussein and the terrorists. They seem to
have missed the terrorists’ boasts that angry Islam is at war with
all Western countries. They have apparently not read the reports
that terrorists have targeted monuments and buildings in their
capital city. And let us remember that the French do have a problem
with their army. Since Napoleon it has been perhaps the most polite
army in Europe. Based on its recent history, I have even composed a
motto for the French army, “Give No Offense.” No wonder they are
reluctant to send troops against Saddam.
Yet there is another source of France’s reluctance to join us in
war against the keeper of weapons of mass destruction and abettor
of terrorism. I encountered a manifestation of it during an elegant
meal in a posh Parisian apartment with a view of the Arc de
Triomphe so intimate that I thought I might reach out the window
and touch the great luminous heap. My dinner companion was telling
me why the French are reluctant to go to war against Hussein. The
reason is Israel. Yes, apparently were it not for Israel the Middle
East would be a peaceful paradise of democracies and smiling
Mohammedans. The only reason that the Middle East’s leaders are all
tyrants (except for Israel’s) and that its youth occasionally
transform themselves into suicide murderers of Westerners is
aggressive Israel…and the Jews.
This additional source of France’s reluctance to fight Saddam is
anti-Semitism, and it goes back in French history to at least the
Twelfth Century when King Philippe Auguste, an otherwise
distinguished French king, found himself sorely-pressed to pay the
bills. So he had the Jews of Paris, who had amassed large
commercial holdings, arrested, imprisoned, and forced to pay for
their freedom. That was in 1180. Two years later he kicked them out
of France and, by the way, grabbed their property. Such
depredations against Jews continued in France for centuries. By the
Twentieth Century out and out stealing had fallen into disfavor,
but the sentiment of bigotry remained, becoming particularly
invidious in the 1930s and taking a grisly turn with the Nazi
occupation of Paris and cowardly Vichy.
In the years following the Holocaust French anti-Semitism has
become more subtle. But it remains and now serves as the mood music
for a new form of overt and criminal anti-Semitism, that carried by
French-born Arabs — often the children of immigrants from former
French colonies. They live in the suburbs around France’s major
cities. They have grown increasingly ardent for militant Islam and
are perpetrators of frequent acts of vandalism against Jewish
properties, cemeteries and synagogues. The polite French wring
their hands and say they will not tolerate it. But the depredations
continue.
What are the French going to do? There is an escapism that the
French adroitly practice. Mention their responsibilities to defend
the West against the angry threats now mounted against us, and they
slip away behind complaints that it is all about Israel. Mention
that they have a proclivity towards genteel anti-Semitism and they
change the subject or confess to it but insist it causes no pain.
But it does. If the French squelched their anti-Semitism they would
take serious action against the Arabs in their midst who now
vandalize Jewish property. Moreover they would stand by the United
States in the looming war with Saddam. They are as much at risk
from weapons of mass destruction and terrorism as are we. But they
are hobbled by old prejudices.
