Religion

New York Times Op-Ed Takes Stand Against Islam In France

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The New York Times published an op-ed Friday highlighting the death of French Jews at the hands of radical Islamic terrorists.

“Anti-Semitism was supposed to be a disease of the far right. But the people actually killing Jews in France these days are not members of the National Front,” staff editor Bari Weiss wrote. “They are Islamists.”

Weiss cited the murder of 85-year-old Mireille Knoll, and said one of the suspects shouted “Allahu Akbar” (God is greater) while he killed her in Paris on March 23.

“One of the suspects told the investigators that the other had shouted ‘Allahu Akbar’ while killing Ms. Knoll, according to Le Monde. (A lawyer for the Knoll family, Gilles-William Goldnadel, confirmed that in a phone call.),” the article reads. “On Tuesday, Gérard Collomb, the interior minister, told Parliament that one of the attackers had told the other: She’s a Jew. She must have money.”

“The major crimes against the Jewish community — Ilan Halimi, the Toulouse killings, the Hyper Cacher killings, Sarah Halimi — all of them have all been carried out by radicalized Muslims,” Robert Ejnes, the executive director of CRIF, an umbrella organization of French Jewish groups, told Weiss.

Weiss also cited a survey of French citizens from different backgrounds and claims it found that Muslims were two to three more times likely to have anti-Jewish feelings than those of any other group in France.

“A survey from that year of about 1,000 French respondents with unknown religious affiliation and 575 self-identified Muslims, conducted by the AJC Paris and the French think tank Fondapol, found that the Muslim respondents were two or three times more likely to have anti-Jewish sentiments than those from the random French group,” he wrote. “Nineteen percent of all respondents felt that Jews had ‘too much’ political power. Among Muslims, the number was 51 percent. As for the idea that Zionism ‘is an international organization that aims to influence the world and society in favor of the Jews,’ 44 percent of Muslims surveyed approved of this statement. The rest of the survey is just as devastating.”

The hate is becoming so fierce in France, according to the column, it’s forcing Jews to contemplate leaving the area entirely.

“Every French Jew — like millions of Jews throughout history — will have to make their own choice about whether to leave their homes for safer shores or to stay and fight for their rightful place in a country that prides itself on being a beacon of liberty and fraternity,” Weiss concluded.

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