Paris: A Jewish man was stabbed four times in a paris suburb
in an anti-Semitic attack, officials said Friday,
as the Israeli offensive in Gaza continued to stoke tension in France.
The 24-year-old man was beaten up late Thursday by two robbers who wanted to steal his car and, after they discovered he was Jewish, pulled out a knife and stabbed him, in the latest in a spate of such attacks.
"After noticing he was wearing a Jewish religious symbol, the aggressors made anti-Semitic threats and stabbed him four times with a knife," the Interior Minister said in a statement.
The man suffered minor wounds from the attack in Fontenay-sous-Bois, southwest of Paris, according to the police sources.
The Interior Minister condemned the assault and vowed: "Everything will be done to arrest the perpetrators. All acts of racism and anti-Semitism ar contrary to the values of the republic."
Home to Europe's biggest Muslim and Jewish populations, France has recorded scores of anti-Semitic incidents since Israel launched its Gaza offensive late last month, drawing appeals for calm from politicians and religious leaders.
Three synagogues have been fire-bombed in the past two weeks and vandals have daubed anti-Israeli graffiti on at least two more.
Vandals wrote "Israel Nazi" and other graffiti overnight near a kosher restaurant in the southern city of Toulouse where a synagogue was attacked two weeks ago.
President Nicolas Sarkozy has vowed "zero tolerance" for hate violence and warned against attempts to import the Arab-Israeli conflict in Gaza.
But as reports of violence continue, the Jewish central Consistoire, the umbrella representative of religious institutions, called on France to take action to end anti-Semitic attacks, saying 66 incidents had been recorded over the past three weeks.
"Are we waiting for the irreparable to happen before we act?" asked the top Jewish body.
Muslim members of the Jewish-Muslim Frendship Association resigned on Friday after accusing their Jewish counterparts of remaining silent in the face of Israeli "war crimes" in Gaza, said co-president Djelloul Seddiki.
"All of the Muslim members left on Thursday," he said, confirming that those leaving included the head of the Paris Grand Mosque, Dalil Boubakeur.
"We aren't talking to each other anymore," confirmed rabbi Michel Serfaty.
But 15 other anti-racism organisations banded together and issued an appeal for French residents of all faiths to "live together" and to "oppose hate".
Ramming a car into the gates of a synagogue or attacking north Aftican students is not the way to help Palestinians or Israelis live together", the authors of the appeal said.
Around 600,000 Jews live in France.
