On Zionism in France and its Opposing Forces

Strategic Culture Foundation
Olga CHETVERIKOVA

Municipal elections took place in France at the end of March and ended with the defeat of the Socialists and the victory of the centre right. The elections’ frontrunner was the Union for a Popular Movement party (UMP), which received 49 percent of the people’s votes, while François Hollande’s Socialist Party took just 42 percent of the votes. Marine Le Pen’s National Front achieved its best result ever, winning more than a thousand local council seats. 

The elections took place against the backdrop of a fall in François Hollande’s rating. Many journalists believed that the elections would be followed by the resignations of the most unpopular cabinet ministers – Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault, Foreign Affairs Minister Laurent Fabius, and Minister of the Interior Manuel Valls. Their expectations did not prove true, however. Laurent Fabius remained in his post, while the odious Manuel Valls became Prime Minister. As Marine Le Pen put it, Ayrault «played the role of the vicarious sacrifice»: the people have changed, but not the politics.

The head of government was replaced on 31 March as the World Jewish Congress (WJC), which calls itself the «diplomatic arm of the Jewish people», began in Paris. It is interesting that the mainstream media in France did not cover the Congress meeting. The Congress’ leadership, which includes the Frenchmen David René de Rothschild and Representative Council of French Jewish Institutions (CRIF). President Roger Cukierman, announced in its press release that it welcomes new Prime Minister Valls’ fight against anti-Semitism, and considers legitimate the measures they have adopted to restrict freedom of speech. François Hollande also drew high praise from the WJC, which the well-known mondialist Jacques Attali, who attended the Congress and is believed to be Holland’s advisor, found more than satisfying. 

Such unanimity once again confirms the closeness of the French president and France’s new prime minister to the international Zionist lobby. Manuel Valls is playing a particularly important role here. He has wide connections with organisations including not just the CRIF, the main lobbying structure of French Jewry, but also the American Jewish Committee (AJC), the Simon Wiesenthal Center, and the Zionist organisation European Leadership Network (ELNET), which was established in 2007 and lobbies for the interests of Israeli business circles in Europe.

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