Opinion
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Dry Bones woosw
TERROR ATTACKS IN
IOWAN?
AND HOPES THAT
ISRAEL'S GAZA PULLOUT
WOULD LEAD TO
Editorial
The French Crossroads
here is a temptation to look
at the upheavals in France
and-recall the old adage
about chickens coming home to
roost.
The perception in the Jewish
community is strong, and largely
accurate, that the French govern-
ment is no friend of Israel's. That
in order to pacify its growing
Muslim minority, the country's
rhetoric and policy appears to hold
Israel responsible for all the prob-
lems in the Middle East.
From its laggard response to
attacks on its own Jewish citizens
by Muslims, to the words of
France's ambassador to Britain,
who called Israel "a sh—y little
country',' the French have made
their sentiments clear.
Now they face the fire, the most
violent rioting in a century, led by
disaffected Muslim youths.
Moreover, it is the tough-talking
Interior Minister Nicholas Sarkozy
who is running high in public
opinion polls — and not President
Jacques Chirac, the principal archi-
T
tect of France's policy stance.
Despite its lofty rhetoric, France
has never embraced the sort of
diversity that is commonplace in
America. Immigrant minorities
aren't considered truly "French,"
even after living there for a genera-
tion or two. The same attitude
holds true in virtually every other
European nation.
There was a moment about 15
years ago, however, when it
appeared that Muslim and Jewish
communities in France would make
common cause against the neo-fas-
cist bully boys of Jean- Marie Le
Pen. But that alliance dissolved
when the threat from Le Pen eased.
He's- still out there, though, and
these riots feed right into his polit-
ical base. A stronger Le Pen is not
good news for French Jews.
There is also the chance that
France will react to the rioting as
Spain did after the bombing of
Madrid's railroad system and
become even less willing to con-
front terrorism and Muslim
extremists.
Up until the Six-Day War, France
was Israel's main benefactor.
Without the French, Israel would
not have been able to build the
Dimona reactor and become a
nuclear power when it did.
British journalist David Pryce-
Jones, writing in Commentary
magazine earlier this year, traces
France's negative attitude toward
Israel to Charles De Gaulle. He
insisted that France pursue an
independent policy in the Middle
East that was deliberately weighted
against American support for
Israel. De Gaulle saw it as the way
for France to maintain its rele-
vance in the international arena.
So it backed leaders like Yasser
Arafat of the Palestinian Authority
and Saddam Hussein of Iraq to
gain these ends. But while French
policy never amounted to more
than "nuisance value says Pryce-
Jones, the "resentments and ten-
dencies to violence" of its own
Muslim minority has been
"whipped up in so small part by
the inflexible hostility displayed by
INT'L PRESSURE ON
THE PA TO DISARM
THE TERRORISTS?
www.drybonesblog.blogspotcom
the French state to Jewish self-
determination!'
Another French diplomat, its
ambassador to Lebanon, has stat-
ed,"Israelis suffer from a neurosis,
a veritable mental disorder that
makes them anti-French."
Well, one need not be mentally
unbalanced to find fault with
French foreign policy. And it
remains to be seen which national
disorder is more urgently in need
of treatment. ❑
E-mail your opinion in a letter to the
editor of no more than 150 words
to: letters@thejewishnews.com .
Reality Check
Snow And Other Folly
t is the policy of all television
stations in Detroit to foment
public hysteria by treating
every 2-inch snowfall as a catas-
trophe, ranking right up there
with being hit by an asteroid.
Now the newspapers are get-
ting in on the game. They are at a
hopeless disadvantage because
broadcast media can be right out
there shrieking when the flakes
begin to fall.
I noticed last week, however,
that the Free Press carried an
item on its front page warning
that "if high winds and blowing
leaves weren't bad enough, snow
is in the forecast!'
It is November, unless I missed
something. And this is the very
same newspaper that takes an
unequivocal stand against global
I
38
warming on its editorial page.
So what kind of weather, in
heaven's name, does the Free
Press want?
Shouldn't the big chill be wel-
comed as climatic balance? Isn't
it our first line of defense against
the warming the paper abhors?
Shouldn't we don our wintry
apparel with a sense of gladness
that nature has reaffirmed its
accustomed order?
It's Michigan in November.
Rejoice, and if you own property
in Florida or Arizona rejoice even
more.
While we're on the subject,
.what's with the WXYZ-TV motto
of "7's on your side"?
What exactly is that supposed
to mean? On my side against
what? Famine? Pestilence?
Channel 4 News?
dated for every public
I need all the help I
school in Michigan by
can get, but I'd really
the legislature.
like to know just who it
I'll let my battling bud-
is Channel 7 and I are
dies at Channel 7 tackle
comrades in arms
that conundrum. I've got
against.
other concerns.
How about dumb-
For example, the
ness? Let's link forces
George Cantor media keep referring to
and go to battle against
Columnist
Bush's Deputy Chief of
that.
Staff Karl Rove as some
The other night I was talking
kind of great political genius. All
to my college journalism class
the while, Bush's public approval
about the possibility of a fili-
has been falling faster than the
buster against President George
November thermometer in
W. Bush's latest nominee to the
Ishpeming.
U.S. Supreme Court. I looked
It kind of makes you wonder
around the room and suddenly
where he'd be if Rove weren't so
realized half of my scholars had
darn smart.
no idea what a filibuster was.
And after initial expressions of
This despite the fact that civics shock and horror at the Iranian
is the only class currently man-
President's statement that Israel
should be wiped off the map, the
story kind of faded from sight.
Most of Iran's international apol-
ogists now seem to chalk it up to
high spirits.
Just imagine, if you will, what
the response would be if an
American political leader sug-
gested that if there is another ter-
rorist attack in this country by
Muslim extremists the response
should be to nuke Mecca.
The screaming would never
end. Anyone making such a
statement would be castigated or
at least drawn and quartered. It
could never be explained away or
lived down.
Of course, I can't imagine any
sane leader making such a sug-
gestion. But, excuse me, I forgot.
We were talking about Iran. Li
November 24 200b