Elif Kayi, Z Word’s European press reviewer, reports on coverage in the French press of a row over President Nicolas Sarkozy’s son which centers on antisemitism.
“You can cut off my balls.” That was the considered response of Siné, cartoonist and columnist for the French satirical journal Charlie Hebdo, to angry entreaties that he retract a remark he made about the relationship between Jean Sarkozy, son of the President, and Jessica Sebaoun-Darty, a Jewish heiress, which was widely judged as antisemitic.
Writing in his weekly column on July 2nd, Siné reflected on the media speculation that the young Sarkozy would convert to Judaism before marrying Darty. Should Jean Sarkozy do so, wrote Siné, he would “make his way, this little fellow!”
Journalist Claude Askolovitch led the counter-charge. Interviewed on RTL, he denounced the notion underlying the article - that to advance in life, it is better to be Jewish. The editor of Charlie Hebdo, Philippe Val, asked Siné to withdraw his remarks and then fired him when he didn’t.
In an article for Le Nouvel Observateur, Siné was defiant: ”I was never an anti-Semite, I am not an anti-Semite and I will never be an anti-Semite. I condemn strongly those who are, but I have no respect either for all those, Jews or non-Jews, who throw this dirty word to the face of their adversaries in order to discredit them, since it is clear that this accusation is the supreme insult since the Holocaust. It is becoming really unbearable!”
Siné also took the opportunity to restate his anti-Zionist position: ”I feel as much antipathy for those, once more Jews or non-Jews, who defend the Israeli regime as for those who were defending apartheid in South Africa .”
Presented as a victim of what some described as a new witch hunt, Siné received wide support in the media. Humorist Guy Bedos wrote an open letter published on the blog Rue89, in which he attacked Charlie Hebdo boss Philippe Val: “You are to Charlie Hebdo what Sarkozy is to France with one difference: he was elected Siné, an antisemite? Have you read David Grossmann and Amos Oz, Israeli writers, who relentlessly fight in Israel against the current Israeli government? Are they too antisemites?” On the same blog, the attorney Gisèle Halimi also attacked Val for firing Siné: ”This operation is part of the ever more numerous witch hunts aimed at maintaining the image of the persecuted Jew.”
In the leftist weekly magazine Marianne, journalist Philippe Cohen criticized the position of Siné, typical in his eyes of a large number of intellectuals, especially on the left, for camouflaging their antisemitism under the guise of anti-Zionism. And in a column for Le Monde, renowned writer Bernard-Henri Levy ended with an acidic observation: “What counts are the words. And what counts, beyond the words, are the history, the memory, the imagination that is haunted. Beyond these words, the French ear could not not hear the echo of even the most rancid anti-Semitism.”
Interesting sequence of events here: Sine makes an antisemitic crack against Sarkozy Jr. He gets called on it. Neither he, nor those taking his side, defend his remark. Instead, they burnish Sine’s anti-Israel credentials.
It’s become the standard justification for antisemitism: “But I hate Israel, surely I’m allowed…”
Sine is not an antisemite: he is antireligion, antichrist, antimuslim and antijews, he hates the army, the bosses, the clergy, the hunters, the government, he is also sexist and doesn’t like the gay pride parade. He is a talented veteran cartoonist who writes a weekly diatribe in Charlie Hebdo since the sixties. Charlie Hebdo is a satirical newspaper that always valued provocation and freedom of speech(for example, they published the infamous Muhammad cartoons, were sued and won). Many people feel that its editor in chief, Philippe Val is a hypocrite who was only looking for an excuse to fire Sine because he denounced the fact that Charlie Hebdo and Clearstream (a corporation under investigation for corruption)had the same lawyer.
As my French is from high school, can you help: wasn’t there a reference to Sine choosing either between the Muslim females in a chador and the “shaved heads” of Jewish women and he’d choose the Muslim? Is that available in French? And my point would be: what has shaved heads of Hassidic women to do with Sarkozy Jr.? His wife is going to shave her head? There’s were the real antisemitism is!
Francis,
“Sine is not an antisemite: he is antireligion, antichrist, antimuslim and antijews…”
There’s an interesting slide there — I don’t know if it’s yours or his — from ‘antireligion, antichrist’ to ‘antimuslim, antijew’. Anti-Judaism and anti-Islam would be defensible positions, but anti-Jew means antisemite by definition, and anti-Muslim is racism by any name. Maybe English isn’t your native language and you meant to say ‘antijudaism’, but in fact that’s not what got Siné in trouble at Charlie Hebdo. He isn’t being criticised for saying anything about the Jewish religion, but for repeating one of the ancient slurs against the character of Jews as people and as a community. That, again, is antisemitic and Brian from Toronto is spot on about the way Siné, rather than withdraw his libel, slips his antisemitism back in his pocket and brings out his antizionism to wave as a distraction.
Another false comparison is the right to publish the Mohammed cartoons and Sine’s libel.
Double standards
You can humiliate the entire religion and its prophet and link them to terrorism. That’s fine because you protect the freedom of expression. On the other hand, if you relate wealth or money to another religion you are anti-Semite and you loose your job. what a hypocrisy.
I wish you could see some of the stuff Siné has published for decades against Catholics, Muslims, the military, women, homosexuals, etc…, he is a known provocateur.
The article who got him into trouble was not about the Jewish people, it was about Jean Sarkozy, who, at 21, has already proven he is a very ambitious opportunist, like his father. So, when, after his recent engagement to one of the wealthiest French heiresses, who happens to be Jewish, and several publications stated, wrongly it is now said, that “Prince Jean”, who doesn’t give the impression of being much interested in religion, was converting to Judaism, Siné said something like “this boy will go far”, it is, the way most people read it, a sneer at the guy. But some saw in it something like “latent anti-semitism”. And there were long-standing disagreements between the magazine owner over political matters and pressure from the Sarkozy family. There has been many incidents since the last two years about Sarkozy, who is friendly with the owners of most of the French media, pressuring, threatening and insulting journalists. Not an happy state of affair.
Looks like the way there are recurring accusations of “French anti-semitism” seems to be backfiring and this silly incident is some kind of last straw.
A few evenings back, a guy walking in the street in France was asked by two louts “are you a Muslim ?”. The guy said yes and was savagely attacked. Police managed to arrest one of the perps and found a stash of neo-nazi publications and symbols in his appartment. This has barely been mentioned in the national press and not at all in the international one.
To Yisrael Medad
To answer this question, that (tasteless) Siné sentence about a Muslim woman in a chador and a shaved Jewish woman is from another article written some time back and is interpreted as meaning he would prefer a well-groomed Jewish woman to the chador lady.
Rabidly anti-religious Siné particularly dislikes veiled Muslim women and wrote last month that “whenever I see a veiled Muslim woman, I want to kick her in the ass”.
By the way “Siné the anti-semite”’s first wife and their daughter are Jewish and they both signed the petition defending him against these accusations of anti-semitism. Enough with the witch-hunting !
Sine’s statement wasn’t about Jewishness. Sine’s statement was about Jean Sarkozy being opportunistic and being prepared to convert to Judaism to access the riches of the Darty empire heiress. Darty = money, not Jewishness. It was said in the context of an ‘Arab’ who had been victim of J. Sarkozy’s doing a runner after having hit the person in question’s car. The case kept being delayed in court (not because J.Sarkozy is or would like to be a Jew, but thanks to his father’s long arms…). Sine isn’t the first person to be the victim of Sarkozy Sr (see a high-ranking police officer on Corsica being moved the other day because he hadn’t reacted violently enough to a nationalist protest aimed a one of Sarko’s actor friends…). Sine’s article was written for a satirical paper. Even if J. Sarkozy weren’t opportunistic (only in love..), this still doesn’t make Sine an anti-semite. As for anti-Sionism, that’s another BIG debate.
Reading Charlie Hebdo requires a sense of irony and an ability not to take things literally (or at least it did until recently). The whole point of this paper is/was to deflate anyone or any community fuelled by hypocrisy or who think they know better than others. One-track minds and conformists will always be upset when reading it. Sine is an anti-conformist.
oliver