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| Killings in Frogistan | ||||
| 2003-12-01 | ||||
After a European Union poll found that nearly 60% of Europeans consider Israel the greatest threat to world peace, the British Broadcasting Corp. on November 26, asked if anti-Semitism is really increasing. âThere was outrage and shock over the recent EU poll,â observed Robert Wistrich, director of Jerusalemâs Vidal Sassoon International Center for the Study of anti-Semitism. Many Israelis consider mainstream labeling of âIsrael as a Nazi stateâ a sort of anti-Semitism.
"Of course itâs absurd! Itâs more like 1938!" Oh really? Serotta made this bizarre claim precisely a week after two Paris Jews were brutally murdered and disfiguredâbecause they were Jewish. A minor tabloid, Le Parisien, reported the grisly events. But not a single major French newspaperâLe Monde, Figaro or Liberationâpicked up the story, according to an interview with the DJâs mother, distributed by Rosenpress in Revue-Politique.com. The police warned one victimâs family not to call the crime anti-Semitic. "Letâs call a spade a club, shall we?" Sebastian Sellam, 23, was a popular disc jockey at a hot Parisian night club called Queen. At about 11:45 p.m. on Wednesday November 19, the young man known as DJ Lam C (a reverse play on his surname) left the apartment he shared with his parents in a modest building in of Parisâ 10th arrondissement near la Place Colonel Fabien, heading to work as usual. In the underground parking lot, a Muslim neighbor slit Sellamâs throat twice, according to the Rosenpress interview. His face was completely mutilated with a fork. Even his eyes were gouged out. Following the crime, Rosenpress correspondent Alain Azria reported, Sellamâs mother said the Muslim perpetrator mounted the stairs, his hands still bloody, and announced his crime. âI have killed my Jew. I will go to heaven,â he reportedly said.
The murder especially traumatized the Paris Jewish community: According to Rosenpress, another gruesome murder, also allegedly committed by a Muslim, occurred earlier that evening. Chantal Piekolek, 53, was working in her Avenue de Clichy shoe store when Mohamed Ghrib, 37, stabbed her 27 times in the neck and chest. Piekolekâs 10-year-old daughter hid in the basement storeroom beneath the shop with a girlfriend and heard the entire crime. There was no evidence of sexual assault, according to Rosenpress. Paris reporters believe the cash remained in the shopâs register, but this detail remained unconfirmed at press time. A report apparently based on Le Parisien story also appeared in Franceâs biggest Jewish newspaper, Actualité Juive, which added little. The report strangely named the DJâs alleged murderer only by his first name. No surname was given. A reliable Paris journalist says the story is correct. Initial reports in small news outlets naturally terrified and confused the French Jewish community. Intense anti-Semitism has been building there for more than a decade, according to Nidra Poller, an American expatriate living in Paris for several decades. Anti-Semitic crimes frequently go unreported in the major press, she said, suppressed by French authorities, victims fearing retribution, and news agencies themselves. Jewish community members thus most often learn of attacks as they did during previous centuries in North African and Eastern European ghettoesâby word of mouth. In 2001, a rabbi in Pollerâs neighborhood was kidnapped and held hostage in a car for two hours. Another religious Jew was kidnapped in similar fashion, Poller reported. A Jewish woman and her husband, whom she had just picked up at a local hospital, were abused and threatened with murder for several hours by a Muslim taxi driver, she said. The charged, anti-Semitic atmosphere in France naturally engenders panic each time a Jewish community member suffers an attack. Crimes typically include harassment, kidnapping, assault, rock-throwing, arson and other abuse, Poller said. Victims usually report the incidents to officials, families and friends. Stories thus spread like wildfire, terrifying people, she noted. Just as frequently, authorities refuse to investigate. Reports are then followed by official and other denialsâstoking the communityâs fear. People donât know what to believe, Poller said. Desperate for verifiable data, they attempt to trace reports through sources back to the victims. But those seeking information are generally told to back off. âThey are left wondering whether their sources are correcting wild rumors or covering up dastardly anti-Semitism,â said Poller. French Jews consequently live in constant fear, Poller said. Everyday activities, such as taking a taxi, going to synagogue or shopping can bring attacks. The entire community is traumatized. This pattern was effectively repeated with the November murders in Paris. After initially reporting Piekolekâs murder as an anti-Semitic crime, the respected Guysen Israel News issued a rectification altering essential details. In revised reports, the news service claimed that reports Piekolek was Jewish were mistaken. Other sources say her husband is Jewish, according to Poller. Parisian Jews are frightened and confused, she said. Was the initial report on Piekolek correct? Was her murder verifiably not an anti-Semitic crime? Or are denials based on terrified rejection of facts? (Her husband was Jewish, so it was not âanti-Semitic.â) Are Paris Muslims really starting to slaughter Jews? âIn Paris, a lot of Jews already had to leave countries in North Africa,â Poller said. âNow, they are told not to talk about anti-Semitism. And they are going to have to flee again.â They just might. Alas, it is easy after all to believe the worst. A few days earlier, an anti-Semitic arson attack hit the Jewish Merkatz Hatorah boysâ school on the outskirts of Paris. Prime-Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin afterwards said he hoped to identify âthose who carried out this shameful attack.â "Je suis fâché. Vraiment." Given intense and worsening anti-Semitism in France and Europe, there seems little hope that the government will actually investigate the arson, much less prosecute the perpetrators if it finds them. After all, EU officials deny the severity of the problem. Last week, they shelved an EU report on the subject for fear of antagonizing Muslims, who were behind many of the incidents examined. Many anti-Semitic crimes are never even reported, Poller said. Would they have been investigated? When Poller left France on a speaking tour of the U.S. this month, she brought one weekâs news publications to read on her flightâtwo weekly magazines and three major newspapers. All of them, she said, were âreeking with hatred [for Jews].â They also sympathized extensively with terrorists. News reports are not factual. âThey are sermons,â Poller said. A profile of philosopher Gilles Deleuze in the weekly Nouvel Observateur, for example, praised his defense of the Palestinians, citing an article he wrote on âle grandeur de Arafat,â despite his personal responsibility for more than 1,000 civilian murders. EU officials may not want to admit it. But attacks on Jews have been mounting since the terrorist war on Israel began in September 2000. In the last year, however, anti-Semitic attacks in France have grown increasingly bold. In January, Paris Rabbi Gabriel Farhi was attacked several times. In April 2002 alone, the French Interior Ministry recorded nearly 360 anti-Semitic crimes against Jews and Jewish institutions, according to Washington Times reporter Al Webb. In May 2002, a mysterious fire erupted at the Israeli embassy in Paris. âYes, a synagogue was burned,â Frenchmen routinely admit, according to Poller. âBut how do we know this was anti-Semitic?â
Loud sounds like harp strings breaking, followed by cries of "Merde!" followed. Something considerably darker than professional jealousy must be at work when a murderer completely mutilates his victimâs face with a fork and gouges out his eyes or stabs a 53-year-old mother 27 times in the chest and neck.
"Heil Haman!" Right. And two grisly ritual murders last week in Paris, France were not anti-Semitic. | ||||
| Posted by:Atrus |
| #9 You know if I was a Jew,living in France I would be packing heavy iron. |
| Posted by: raptor 2003-12-2 8:05:24 AM |
| #8 A link about France's troubles. You know you want to read it. Apparently written in french, and translated into basic english, so it's not great reading, and it's VERY didactical (I love the lil' drawings). Still, it explains a lot about that country. http://www.freeworldacademy.com/globalleader/france.htm |
| Posted by: Anony-moose 2003-12-1 4:46:35 PM |
| #7 "Formating school" -- where young French kids go to have their simple, common sense OS erased and replaced with the "French" operating system. (sorry, Anon, couldn't resist a good geek reference) |
| Posted by: snellenr 2003-12-1 4:41:04 PM |
| #6 Correction : I actually remember Chantal Piekolek's murder; it was presented as a motiveless slashing. What was unusual in the reports was that the perp 's name was given (unwritten law : whenever muslims are involved in a crime of some sort, names are not given) and his ID pics broadcasted (ugly, scary MF). "Formating " = bad english; what I meant was that elite are technocrats that all come from a handful of prestigious schools (mostly ENA, Ecole normale supérieure & polytechniques), and that media technocrats also have their own prestigious school, the CFJ, that "formate" their mind. |
| Posted by: Anonymous 2003-12-1 4:21:08 PM |
| #5 most of their cadre are formed in formating schools What's a formating school? Post grad finishing? |
| Posted by: Shipman 2003-12-1 4:05:03 PM |
| #4 I'm shocked by the acts, but not by their apparent cover-up by big media (really didn't heard of it, even on continous news channels; perhaps on parisian regional news reports?). Antisemitism is surging since 3 yrs, but the problem has been timidly acknowledged only since a few weeks. This is only going to worsen, and the jews are the proverbial canary in the coal mine. OT : some of you may bitch about how biased CNN and the likes are, but, believe me I watch CNN with relief. Censorship is not the problem, mindset is. French media are owned by big-business, are overtly deferrent to politicians, overhelmingly left-leaning (72% IIRC), most of their cadre are formed in formating schools (and many "celebrities" are ex-trotskysts, very chic). They are basically an integral part of an isolated, self-reproducing "aristocracy" (France's true ennemy is its elite), a mouthpiece for the powerstructure and its choices (appeasment toward islam, containment of the US power, pro-arab/anti-israeli foreign policy, thirdworldism, EU integration, collectivism,... and generally, enforcing the statu quo at all costs), period. |
| Posted by: Anonymous 2003-12-1 3:57:45 PM |
| #3 Capt. Joe -- Absolutely. We should make an open offer of asylum/immigration to all European Jews. We should also halt immigration from Arab countries, at least temporarily, pointing to the European experience as the reason. |
| Posted by: Robert Crawford 2003-12-1 3:43:13 PM |
| #2 French Jews need to take the gloves off. Once there is retaliation then you'll see the big papers pick up the story. Lines will be drawn and shit can hit the fan. But maybe being French they are inclined to turn the other cheek. Remember "never again". |
| Posted by: Lucky 2003-12-1 3:19:13 PM |
| #1 The US should make a public offer of refuge to French Jews. France and the EU would work themselves into a knot trying to spin that one. |
| Posted by: capt joe 2003-12-1 3:08:14 PM |