Former French foreign minister Bernard Kouchner says “France has always been antisemitic.” Has it really? “‘France has always been antisemitic,’ former French foreign minister says,” by Mathilda Heller, Jerusalem Post, October 22, 2024: Kouchner lamented a lack of knowledge of Jewish history: “We talk about colonization, about hatred, about territorial expansion, about genocide. But we […]

Has France “always been antisemitic”? That’s what former French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner claimed on October 2. The answer is, well, yes and no. Outbreaks of antisemitism there certainly have been, as in the 14th century, when Jews in southern France were accused of spreading the Black Death. Jews had lower rates of the disease […]