Franco-Israeli, Julien Bahloul was a journalist at I24 News. In the past, the author also served as a reservist in the IDF Spokesman's Unit. Now a business development manager in an Israeli high-tech company in Tel Aviv, he regularly analyzes Israeli news on Twitter and in several French media.
Next month, in mid-June, LFI MK Ersilia Soudais plans to visit Israel as part of her fact-finding mission to the National Assembly's Foreign Affairs Committee. The announcement of his participation in this trip was made public a few days ago. How would you react if a woman who methodically insults your family and sullies the memory of your ancestors invited herself into your home? This is how we, French from Israel, perceive the visit of the LFI MP to our country.
This is not a question of right or left. Some of us have been demonstrating every Saturday for months against the policies of the Netanyahu government. Others openly support it. Some of us are religious, some of us are not. We are far from forming a homogeneous bloc. But when the State of Israel or the Jews are attacked, we put aside our differences to form a united front. Criticism of Israeli policies has never been questioned. We do not hesitate to do so publicly on social networks. It is a question of denouncing the unacceptable positions taken by MP Ersilia Soudais. There are many examples. Here are a few.
A few days later hundreds of missiles were fired by Islamic Jihad against the cities of southern Israel. Of course, not a word of compassion for them. Not a tweet of support for the civilian population.
Julien Bahloul
On September 13, 2022, the elected LFI wrote in a tweet a tribute to the director Godard whose controversial remarks on Jews are notorious. In this tweet Ersilia Soudais dares this parallel by writing: "He (Godard) refused that one drama mask another, such as the Holocaust for Palestine". Putting the genocide of six million Jews on an equal footing with a territorial conflict in the Middle East had to be daring. A few weeks later, on December 18, 2022, she reoffended and again attacked the memory of the Holocaust. She appeared at Roissy when Salah Hamouri arrived and tweeted: "We came to welcome Salah Hamouri at the airport, after his deportation orchestrated by Israel." The offense is twofold. First, by defending Salah Hamouri, a former member of the PFLP (organization recognized as terrorist by Europe) who pleaded guilty to the plan to kill a rabbi. The PFLP is responsible for the deaths of dozens of Israelis and is suspected of being behind the attack on the synagogue on Rue Copernic in Paris on October 3, 1980.
Read alsoGilles-William Goldnadel: "The far left thought to disqualify Israel, it is she who disgraced herself"
Then by using the term "deportation" to designate his expulsion. It thus appeals in the collective consciousness to the lexicon of the Holocaust: Hamouri in the role of the persecuted Jew, Israel in the role of the Nazi. On February 19, 2023, she takes a photo in front of the National Assembly with pro-Palestinian activists she says in a tweet to have received to "discuss the fight against anti-Semitism and solidarity with the Palestinian people". And to add the hashtag "#FreePalestine". What is the connection between the two if not trying to clear his anti-Zionism of any suspicion of anti-Semitism? What is the legitimacy of these activists of the Palestinian cause to evoke the fight against anti-Semitism in France?
The latest provocation was on May 4. She defends at the microphone in the National Assembly the adoption of a resolution calling the State of Israel an apartheid regime. An insult to the memory of the victims of apartheid in Africa and an absurdity far removed from any reality on the ground. A few days later hundreds of missiles were fired by Islamic Jihad (a Palestinian group recognized as terrorist by Europe) against the cities of southern Israel. In this region live tens of thousands of French people. MP Ersilia Soudais will, of course, not have a word of compassion for them. Not a tweet of support for the civilian population.
Jacques Chirac is the perfect example that it is possible to criticize Israel without sinking into anti-Zionism with anti-Semitic overtones.
Julien Bahloul
Does being a "peace activist" mean to her that she has to make a choice between innocent lives? Would the lives of Israeli children in their parents' arms running in the middle of the night to shell shelters be less valuable than Hamouri's? Would it be impossible for her to criticize an Israeli military operation while showing support for Palestinian and Israeli civilians at the same time? Why this sorting between lives? What is he hiding? Why the lack of condemnation of Islamic Jihad rocket fire, some of which killed Palestinian lives?
Some believe that we label anyone who dares to criticize Israeli policies as anti-Semites. Nothing could be further from the truth. The President of the Republic Jacques Chirac was a vehement defender of the Palestinian cause and had made very harsh remarks against Ariel Sharon. But we all knew that he was beyond reproach on the fight against anti-Semitism in France and on the preservation of the memory of the Holocaust. He is the perfect example that it is possible to criticize Israel without sinking into anti-Zionism with anti-Semitic overtones.
The France Insoumise will not be able to shout again at the Israeli far right to criticize our approach. Not this time. My positions against the current Israeli government are known and posted on Twitter day after day. Herbert Pagani said: "When Israel is out of danger, I will choose among the Jews and my Arab neighbors those who are brothers to me in ideas. In the meantime, I must stand in solidarity with all my people, in the name of this insurmountable enemy: racism." In the continuity of this same fight, we French Israel, right and left, ask MP Ersilia Soudais to give up her trip.
/cloudfront-eu-central-1.images.arcpublishing.com/prisa/KMEYMJKESBAZBE4MRBAM4TGHIQ.jpg)
