Following the French election, the majority of French Jews took a sigh of relief when Emmanuel Macron defeated Marine Le Pen. A staggering 90% of the French Jewish community opposed Le Pen, whose father was a known Holocaust denier. Le Pen won 34% of the votes throughout the country. The Jewish People Policy Institute in Jerusalem mentioned that while French Jews were happy that Macron won, the majority remained skeptical of their safety in France.
Over the past few years, tens of thousands of French Jews left the country to make aliyah to Israel following a series of anti-Semitic incidents and terrorist attacks that rocked the French nation. The most infamous cases of anti-Semitic violence included a massacre at a Jewish school in Toulouse and the shooting in the kosher Hyper Cacher grocery store following the Charlie Hebdo massacre. More recently, French Jews have nearly had their fingers sawed off by attackers and an Orthodox Jewish woman was stabbed and thrown out a window as late as April. Following the election, Macron’s offices were defaced with anti-Semitic graffiti.
Enter Dirshu, a Jewish educational organization that has more than 50 centers in the United States that represent a support system for Jews to provide opportunities for them to study and nourish their souls. On May 15, members of the group will travel to Israel before heading to France on a goodwill mission to give support to the French Jewish community. Once they arrive in Israel, they will meet with French Member of Parliament Meir Habib, the first observant Jew to hold office in the French National Assembly.
Dirshu will then travel to France along with Habib to meet with several government officials, the head of security for one of the Jewish communities in France, and various student groups to let them know that they are available to support them. In light of the troubling times in France, their goal is to give French Jews a sense of security that the Jewish communities will remain empowered and safe. The goal is to lend faith and hope to French Jewry and to encourage Macron to bring positive change to that community.
Dirshu’s American spokesman Pesach Tropper spoke with The Daily Wire to explain why it is important for Dirshu to lend support to the French Jewish community and why Americans should pay attention as well:
After we were attacked on 9/11 it meant a lot to Americans when other countries showed us their support. When a community is going through a tough time, it is good to know others in the world care about you.
In times like these, just a singular gesture of goodwill will give comfort to a community that needs it most. While it remains unknown as to what Macron’s tenure as President will mean for the French Jewish community and for France as a whole, it is encouraging to see that the Jewish people are coming together to take the darkness and bring it into the light.