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French Jews Migrate To Israel Citing Rising Anti-Semitism
Posted: 02/08/2014 9:39 pm EST Updated: 02/08/2014 9:59 pm EST


PARIS (RNS) By any standard, David Tibi is a French success story.

The 44-year-old dentist and father of five has a thriving practice and a house in the affluent Paris suburb of Vincennes. His wife is a doctor and he is a leading member of the Jewish community and holds a senior post in its Central Consistory of Paris.

But in early July, the Tibi family will pack their bags and join the thousands of Jews now leaving France. The house has been sold. A colleague will be handling the dental practice. The family is leaving on a one-way ticket to Israel.

“If my children are to live their full Jewish identity, their future is in Israel and not in France,” Tibi said during an interview at his office in northeastern Paris, an area packed with kosher stores and restaurants. “Many Jews feel this way. There’s a massive desire to leave.”

Worldwide, immigration to Israel has stagnated and even declined. But French Jews are bucking the trend. Last year, a record 3,270 French Jews made aliyah — or immigration to Israel — a 63 percent hike from 2012. The Jewish Agency, which promotes aliyah internationally, estimates that figure could spike to 5,000 as early as this year, dramatically changing the face of Israeli immigration as well as France’s own Jewish community, the largest in Western Europe.

“For Jews today, Israel allows them to reinforce their Jewish identity,” said Ariel Kandel, who made his own aliyah from France 20 years ago and now directs the Jewish Agency in France.

A mix of factors are driving the exodus, Kandel and others say, from historical and sentimental ties — many of France’s majority Sephardic population have family in Israel — to economic ones. In January, French unemployment rose to a record 11 percent. Israel’s, by contrast, hovers at about 6 percent.

But rising anti-Semitism may be the strongest driver, manifest not only through rhetoric but also action. In 2012, a radical Islamist gunned down four people at a Jewish school in Toulouse.................>>>>............................>>>>.....................http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/02/08/french-jews-israel_n_4748532.html