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17 Sivan 5772 - June 7, 2012 | Mordecai Plaut, director Published Weekly
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NEWS
The CRIF: The Anti-Semitic Attack in Lyons is an Extension of the Murders in Toulouse

By Arnon Jaffe, Paris

Police cars are parked on Rue Francis de Francois opposite the Beis Menachem Boyle School in the suburb of Lyons. Investigators from a police judicial unit are making a house-to-house search for the Arab attackers of the three Jewish youths who were injured from blows by a hammer and metal bars as they were en route to mincha. This additional anti- Semitic assault in France almost ended in their deaths. The community cannot understand why the attackers, who are well known in the quarter, are not being apprehended, and all signs clearly point to Islamic groups operating in Lyons.

One eyewitness told a European radio station that he saw an Arab striking a Jew with a hammer and was certain that he would finish him off. Passersby who intervened were able to rescue the Jews by summoning the police and indeed, as soon as they heard the sirens, the attackers fled. Other witnesses reported that several minutes before, three Arabs, defined by the French press as "unidentified youths", began screaming anti-Semitic curses and then started pushing their victims. A violent attack such as this against French Jews, coming on the heels of the traumatic murder of three Jewish children and Rav Sandler in Toulouse, has aroused the shocked reaction and censure from the Socialist heads of government, who are dealing with the first attack of its kind during their newly elected rule.

The CRIF, the umbrella organization of French Jewry, is trying to convince them that anti-Semitic violence in Lyons is an extension of the Islamic attack in Toulouse and under the influence of Islamic murderer Muhamad Marach, who was killed in a shoot-out with police, rather than being an isolated incidence by a street gang. Ariel Goldman, head of the security force in the community, reported that since the elimination of the Islamic murderer on March 22, attacks of this nature have been on the increase: "We have counted 140 acts of violence since then," he said. Richard Pasquier, head of the CRIF, said, "We hear shouts against Jewry in the Moslem quarters, such as `Marach was a hero and we will avenge his death.' During the attack in Lyons, there were similar shouts in praise of Marach."

The authorities have been asked not to ignore the fact that Arab youth regard Marach as a role model. Lawyer Patrick Gluckman said that after Toulouse and the shocked reaction from this horrendous crime, anti-Semitism should have been on the downswing.

 

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