A series of recent court cases in France make clear that French justice does not mean justice for French Jews. In case after case, the charge of antisemitism as an aggravating element was dismissed or ignored in sentencing. More on these troublesome cases can be found here: “French Court Drops Antisemitism Charges in Assault of Three Jewish Students, Sparking Outrage,” by Ailin Vilches Arguello, Algemeiner, September 17, 2026:
A French court on Thursday tossed out antisemitism-motivated charges against a woman convicted of assaulting three Jewish students in a group attack in 2024, in what appears to be yet another instance of France’s legal system brushing aside antisemitism.
The Correctional Tribunal of Strasbourg, in eastern France, handed one defendant a four-month suspended prison sentence — meaning she will not serve the term unless she violates conditions set by the court — and ordered her to pay $2,000 in damages to the three Jewish students for her role in the brutal assault.
Instead, had the court recognized antisemitism as an aggravating circumstance, the maximum sentence could have reached three years in prison, although the judge would still have had discretion to impose a lesser penalty.
The court also acquitted another defendant of assault charges despite testimony from the victims describing her involvement, as well as an audio recording from the incident that appears to capture others telling her to calm down.
In 2024, the two defendants saw a group of Jewish students removing and painting over anti-Israel graffiti at the University of Strasbourg before allegedly texting a group of men and directing them to the scene to confront the students.
At that moment, a group of four men appeared at the scene wearing balaclavas before launching a brutal attack on the three friends — a Jewish man identified as Arthur and his twin sisters, Haya and Shterna — beating them to the ground and calling them “dirty Zionists” as the assault unfolded….
The two female defendants saw the three victims painting over anti-Israel graffiti. They were obviously Jews — who else in France, these days, would efface such graffiti? — and the women called for their bully-boys to arrive and work them over, for being Jews. There was no other conceivable reason. The black-balaclaved men arrived, beat up the three, knocking them to the ground and calling them “dirty Zionists.” Why is that not an antisemitic attack?
In one of the latest cases, a French court tossed out antisemitism-motivated charges against 55-year-old Rachid Kheniche, who was convicted of murdering his 89-year-old Jewish neighbor in 2022, after rejecting the claim that the killing was motivated by the victim’s religion.
According to French media, the magistrate of the public prosecutor’s office refused to consider the defendant’s prior antisemitic behavior, including online posts spreading hateful content, and promoting conspiracy theories about Jews and Israelis, arguing that it was not directly related to the incident itself.
In May 2022, Kheniche threw his neighbor, René Hadjadj, from the 17th floor of his building, an act to which he later admitted.
According to the police investigation, Kheniche and his neighbor were having a discussion when the conflict escalated….
And what do you think that so-called discussion” was about? It was undoubtedly an argument, with the Muslim Kheniche berating his elderly (89 years old) Jewish neighbor because of how badly Israelis were supposedly mistreating Arabs in Gaza.
After several psychiatric evaluations, the court concluded that the defendant was mentally impaired at the time of the crime, reducing his criminal responsibility and lowering the maximum sentence for murder to 20 years.
Oh yes, one more Muslim murderer evading justice by claiming to be mentally impaired — in this case, he claimed to have been having a “paranoid episode.” He had nothing against Jews. Why would a Muslim have anything against Jews? Why, some of his best friends…
Kheniche was ultimately sentenced to 18 years in prison and six years of “socio-judicial monitoring.”
A maddening result. Now this murderer can be released after serving only half of his sentence. He can be out in nine years.
In another case last year, the public prosecutor’s office in Nanterre, just west of Paris, appealed a criminal court ruling that cleared a nanny of antisemitism-aggravated charges after she poisoned the food and drinks of the Jewish family she worked for….
Even though the nanny initially denied the charges against her, she later confessed to police that she had poured a soapy lotion into the family’s food as a warning because “they were disrespecting her.”
The woman who poisoned the Jewish family was open about her hatred: “they [as Jews] have money and power.” She resented them, didn’t like their attitude of “disrespecting her,” and so — why not? — put poison in their food, not enough, she claimed, to kill them, but enough to hurt them badly.
She stated herself that she “resented” the family precisely because they were Jews, with “money and power,” who “disrespected” her — a Muslimah! — but the court refused to admit that constituted proof of antisemitism. It dismissed her own statement because it was made “several weeks after the incident,” as if that passage of time would have caused her to confess to something she had not done, and was made “without a lawyer present” who, presumably, would have counseled her not to make such a remark.
In another shocking case last year, a local court in France dramatically reduced the sentence of one of the two teenagers convicted of the brutal gang rape of a 12-year-old Jewish girl, citing his “need to prepare for future reintegration.”…
The two boys selected the 12-year-old Jewish girl who was gang-raped because she was Jewish. They hurled antisemitic insults while raping her. President Emmanuel Macron denounced the “antisemitic” nature of the attack. So did the Education Minister, Nicole Belloubet. When arrested, the two boys were charged with gang rape, antisemitic insults and violence, and issuing death threats.
Despite that, when one of the boys protested his nine-year-sentence for rape, the court reduced it to seven years. In practice, this means he could be out in 3 ½ years — for rape of a 12-year-old.
Would the court have been so indulgent with the rapists had the victim not been Jewish? Where is the new Zola to issue his “J’accuse”?
Wellington says
France has learned little since the Dreyfus “matter” in the 1890s.
Actually and quite arguably not even a little.