"If 100,000 French people of Spanish origin were to leave, I would never say that France is not France anymore. But if 100,000 Jews leave, France will no longer be France. The French Republic will be judged a failure,” French Prime Minister Manuel Valls said Sunday ahead of a memorial rally in honor of those killed in France in recent days.
He made the comments in an interview with The Atlantic's Jeffery Goldberg as world leaders descended on Paris for a march in honor of the victims of this week's Islamist militant attacks, which saw seventeen people, including journalists and policemen, die in three days of violence that began with a shooting attack on the satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo on Wednesday and ended with a hostage-taking at a kosher supermarket on Friday. The three gunmen were also killed.
Val says today we were told by Jewish friends that French Jews are leaving France in droves, many too scared to go to synagogues in large cities.
Approximately half a million Jews lived in France up until a year ago, making it the largest Jewish community in Europe. But the rise of anti-Semitism has driven many away, according to the chief rabbi of France, Haim Korsia – mainly to the UK, Israel, and North America.
France's Agence Juive, which tracks Jewish emigration, estimates that more than 5,000 Jews left France for Israel in 2014, up from 3,300 in 2013, which was a 73 percent increase on 2012.
Val says I find it hard to believe after the second world war and the atrocities against the Jews that we have not learnt the lessons and some people can still persecute this race.
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