Yonathan Arfi, 42, was elected in the first round (by 149 votes against 74 for Ariel Amar), Sunday new president of the Representative Council of Jewish Institutions of France (Crif), announced the institution.
He succeeds Francis Kalifat, at the head of this organization for eight years and will officially take office on July 26.
The first president of Crif to be in his forties and already a member of its executive board, Yonathan Arfi leads a group of companies active in business consulting and real estate.
"
There is emotion, but there is also the awareness of the responsibilities that weigh on the president of Crif in a particularly turbulent period politically
," reacted Yonathan Arfi to AFP after his election.
“
We have a rise in extremes which represent an unprecedented level of threat for the Jews of France for a few decades, so we obviously have a Crif which reflects these concerns but also this mobilization
”, he added.
A political showcase for the largest Jewish population in Europe (about 500,000 people), Crif brings together some 70 associations, such as the Unified Jewish Social Fund, the Union of Jewish Students in France (UEJF), the Universal Israelite Alliance, etc. ...
More openness to social issues
Its missions are to "
fight against anti-Semitism
", "
preserve and transmit the memory of the Holocaust
" and "
affirm the solidarity
" of the Jewish community "
with Israel
".
Raised in a Sephardic family from Algeria and Morocco, he spent his adolescence in the Yvelines.
He joined the Eclaireurs Israelites de France (scout association), then became president of the UEJF (2003-2005), member of the executive board of Crif in 2007, then vice-president, from 2014 until now.
Among his priorities, Mr. Arfi told AFP that he wanted to "
lead the fight against anti-Semitism, of course, by trying to make French society understand that basically, what threatens the Jews of France threatens the whole of society
”.
He had campaigned by promising more openness of Crif to social issues.