I have noticed that 'anti-semitism within the left wing' is discussed a lot on this site.

My opinion is that there exists anti-semitism in all walks of life, so it should not surprise us if some (very, very, very few) lefties are anti-semitic.

Regardless of your views on Iraq, Palestine, etc. I hope that you will join in agreeing with me when I say that anti-semitism, despite its origins and manifestations, certainly does not represent what left-wing values stand for in reality.

As a Jewish leftie, this whole debate is pissing me off laods because a lot of the time it is quite unncessary... So, we need to consider the true homeland of anti-semitism -not France, but the right-wing. Hopefully these two articles will demonstrate that anti-semitism is and will always be realted primarily to the right-wing.
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 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/2683783.stm

By James Coomarasamy
BBC Paris correspondent

In a small tele-sales office near the Gare du Nord, gap year student Jonathan Taieb persuades another customer that his company should be listed in a new business directory.

But nothing, it seems, can persuade Jonathan to stay in the country where he was born and grew up.

He is part of the growing exodus of French Jews leaving for Israel.

"As a Jew I don't see any future for me in France," he said. "Just put on a skull cap in the street and see the reaction you get. While Muslim girls can wear veils and no-one says a word."

The far right has become popularised in France
In a few weeks he will leave this office for the last time, pack his bags and head for Haifa university to study aeronautics.

Although he is a practising Jew, Jonathan is very different from the Orthodox Jews who have traditionally made the trip back to the Holy Land. This is a part of the reason why, in the past 12 months, the numbers leaving France have doubled.

Olivier Rafowicz runs a Jewish agency in Paris, which helps those who have made a similar choice to Jonathan. He says you cannot pinpoint a single reason why the phones began ringing off the hook last year, although he says it should not come as a surprise.

"Surprise will I think be a lie, we are living in the world and we are aware what is going on of course, in France Le Pen the last year, when he got to the second round of the elections, had a serous impact, and also the aftershock effect of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict."

Indeed the violence in the Middle East was seen as one of the reasons for a series of attacks on French synagogues last year. With Europe's largest Arab and Jewish communities, France is ever sensitive to the possibility of violence far away being reflected close to home.

And now after a relatively calm few months the malaise is creeping back.

At the weekend's anti-war demonstrations it was noticeable how many protesters sang anti-Israeli songs, while just a few weeks ago a liberal Rabbi in Paris was stabbed and had his car set on fire for reasons which remain obscure.

"There is a reduction in the number of violent acts but the atmosphere is still very heavy and we fear that if and when the war with Iraq starts we may face a revival of anti-Semitic acts."

But at the same time he is keen to put the exodus of French Jews in perspective.

In fact, the number of immigrants from France to Israel has increased from 1,000 to 2,000 people, but out of a community of 600,000 people it is really not significant.

"Jews have lived in France for the last 2,000 years," Mr Cukierman says. "There is a saying 'happy like a Jew in France' and I think it is still valid."

Not everyone is so positive though. Listening to Israeli music at home with his father, Jonathan says he is leaving this country with no regrets.

"I'm sad to say goodbye to my family and friends, but France, no. How can I be sad to leave a country which is without exaggeration, anti-Semitic?"

It is the sort of accusation which makes French leaders indignant but also concerned.

In a country which saw Nazi occupation, no-one belittles the significance of Franco-Jewish relations, and as long as French Jews continue to leave and a war in Iraq continues to look likely, it is an issue the authorities here can ill afford to ignore.

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 http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=255495&contrassID=1&subContrassID=0&sbSubContrassID=0

French Jewry stunned by allegations that rabbi
faked stabbing

By Daniel Ben Simon, Ha'aretz Correspondent




The French Jewish community is in an uproar over allegations that Reform Rabbi Gabriel Farhi, who was stabbed on January 3, may in fact have faked the stabbing.

The allegations surfaced in a report this week by the right-wing weekly Marianne, which was then picked up by Le Figaro. The journal reported that police officers investigating the stabbing said it is not clear whether Farhi was actually stabbed by an unknown assailant, and they are not ruling out the possibility that Farhi in fact stabbed himself.

The report stunned French Jewry, which for the past two years has been vociferously protesting law enforcement agencies' failure to take effective action against the hundreds of anti-Semitic attacks the community has suffered.

"You can imagine what a destructive effect this affair could have on the Jewish community," said one community leader, who asked to remain anonymous. "For two years we have been screaming about the attacks against us and the rise of anti-Semitism in France. If, God forbid, it turns out that the stabbing was staged, not just Rabbi Farhi is in trouble, all the Jews are in trouble. Who will take us seriously? And that is without even mentioning the enormous shame caused by the thought that four former prime ministers took the trouble to support the rabbi and the Jewish community. What will we do now? Apologize to them?"
The Reform community is backing Farhi fully. When its executive board met Monday night to elect a new president, all 18 members made a point of shaking Farhi's hand and offering their support. "I assure you that if I or my colleagues in the community had any doubts at all, we would not be expressing our support," said Francis Lentschner, the newly elected president. "There is no doubt that the affair has greatly hurt the community, but I'm certain we'll get over it."

The rumors began to surface immediately after the attack, when police came to investigate. "I've seen assaults and stabbings as part of my job, but I must say that this was a rather strange stabbing," Marianne quoted the officer who led the investigating team as saying. A few days later, the doctor who examined Farhi submitted a report to the police in which he wrote that "the wound does not match the rabbi's version of the assault."

On Wednesday, Farhi and his lawyer, Michel Zaoui, held a press conference to refute the allegations and accused the police of deliberately trying to frame the rabbi. Zaoui, for instance, charged that it was not the doctor's job to draw conclusions about the attack.

Lentschner also cast doubt on the police's motives. "The very day after the attack, rumors circulated in Paris that the rabbi was responsible for his own injury," he said. "The rabbi himself told me that during his interrogation, the police treated him as a suspect rather than as a victim."

And Lentschner also has an explanation for the police's behavior: "It is enough to look at what has happened in France and other countries in the world over the last two years to understand how we reached this pass," he said, referring to the wave of anti-Israel and anti-Semitic feeling that has swept Europe since the outbreak of the intifada.