The president of the University of Strasbourg (Bas-Rhin), Michel Deneken, “condemns with the greatest firmness the anti-Semitic attack which took place on the university campus on the night of Sunday January 28 to Monday January 29, 2024, of which I "I became aware of on Thursday February 1", and which gave rise to complaints being filed.
He explains that “three young Jewish people, including two students, were victims of a physical and verbal attack to the cries of
Zionist fascists
by a group of six people.
The consequences of their attack were noted by local medicine and forensic medicine after filing a complaint with the police.
Michel Deneken said he spoke with one of the victims, a law student.
“He was hit, thrown to the ground, it is a very serious incident,” declared the president of the university.
“This is violence that we have never experienced here.”
Since the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, “we had tags that we erased in the morning to prevent tempers from igniting.
These days we have had some blockages with borderline slogans sometimes in relation to Israel, but this is the first time that we have such serious facts,” he continued, announcing that the university would also file a complaint.
“Anti-Zionist activists”
According to the newspaper L'Alsace, twin sisters aged 23 and a friend, aged 25, went on Sunday evening to the Esplanade campus in Strasbourg to cover up anti-Semitic tags recently drawn on the walls, Allée René -Capitant, near the law school.
It was around 11:30 p.m., the three young people took out paint and posters calling for the release of people held hostage in Gaza.
A young woman asked them to stop, which they did not do, and she returned with five other people, “some of them dressed in dark with surgical masks”, notes the Alsatian daily.
The young man, a law student in Strasbourg, and activist of the Union of Jewish Students of France (UEJF), was able to break away from the group to take refuge in a business that was still open from where he called the police.
When she arrived, the attackers had already left.
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In a press release released Thursday, the UEJF presents these six people as “anti-Zionist activists”.
They allegedly beat the three collectors shouting “Zionist fascists”, indicates the UEJF, specifying that “one of the victims suffered significant bruising”.
The UEJF indicated that it would contact its lawyer, Sacha Ghozlan, to join the complaints filed by the victims.
“This anti-Semitic physical attack committed in a meeting cannot go unpunished,” declared Samuel Lejoyeux, president of the UEJF in a press release.
“It must also serve as a general warning: the demonization of Israel fueled by small far-left groups in universities leads to anti-Semitic violence.
It is urgent to stop tolerating it.”
“This aggression goes against the values of tolerance and humanism that the University of Strasbourg advocates and teaches and which are the foundation of our Nation,” believes the Crif d’Alsace.
Anti-Zionism is an ideology opposed to the Jewish State of Israel or its policies.
Anti-Semitism consists of hatred of Jews.