I have been bombarded for the past several weeks, mainly via social media, by reports from Anglo-American and Israeli websites—each one more alarmist and hysterical than the other—of an apparent upsurge of antisemitism in France. As for the comments threads accompanying these, the France-bashing has been such that I can no longer look at them. To read the Francophobic Jews and right-wingers—mainly American though not only—on these threads, one would think another Rafle du Vél’ d’Hiv is imminent. I have much to say on this subject and will have a special post on it soon, but, in the meantime, need to say something right now about the latest brouhaha—that I naturally learned about via social media—, which is the letter sent two days ago by the Simon Wiesenthal Center to the French Ministry of Interior expressing shock at the discovery of a rural locality in the Loiret, some 100 km south of Paris, called “La-Mort-aux-Juifs,” and requesting that the name be changed. The Wiesenthal Center letter expressed particular shock, moreover, that the existence of a place with such a name could go “unnoticed during seventy years since the liberation of France from the Nazis and Vichy.”
The reason why La-Mort-aux-Juifs went unnoticed all these years was precisely because practically no one had heard of it. The story is presently all over the French media, which is precisely where Frenchmen and women are learning that such a locality exists. A couple of things. First, La-Mort-aux-Juifs has been called a “village” or even “town” in English-language reports, which is inaccurate. It is a “lieu-dit”—which may be translated as “locality” (literally: said place)—, in the commune of Courtemaux (population 239)—itself a place practically no one outside the eastern Loiret has heard of. Communes are the smallest administrative units in France (of which there are some 36,681 in the 101 departments of metropolitan and overseas France, the majority with populations of under 500). Most communes have lieux-dits—which are sometimes indicated, sometimes not—, referring to a bit of the commune that had a specific identity in centuries past. As for La-Mort-aux-Juifs, it consists of two houses and a farm (above photo), is on a country road probably taken by no one except the few people who live around there, and is not indicated on any sign. In other words, even if one drove through the place, one would not know of the lieu-dit’s name.
Secondly, it is not even clear what the name of this lieu-dit is supposed to signify. As a piece in Marianne pointed out—and that I had been wondering about—La-Mort-aux-Juifs does not, in fact, translate as “death to the Jews.” Without the definite article “la” and the dashes—which are generally the rule in place names in France—, it would indeed mean this. But the definite article and dashes change the meaning, which is indeterminate but may simply indicate a place where Jews were killed—maybe even massacred—eight or nine centuries ago. For all one knows, the lieu-dit may have even been named this to commemorate such an event, to remember a tragedy…
As has been reported, the anti-racist association MRAP in fact learned of the existence of the lieu-dit in the early 1990s and sought (unsuccessfully) to have the name changed. Pour l’info, the MRAP is left-wing—it was a longtime front group of the Communist party and retains an affinity with it—and has organizationally participated in some of the pro-Palestine/anti-Israel demonstrations in French cities over the past month. Just sayin’.
Arun with a View 
Sadly, I have lost much respect for the Wiesenthal Centre over the years — they seem to be happy to whip up faux scandals in order to keep a high profile, a far cry from their origins in Simon Wiesenthal’s virtuous hunting of Nazi war criminals. This issue seems to be very much of the faux variety.
The notice on the Simon Wiesenthal Centre’s English-language website that mentions this letter states the following:
‘The letter suggested, “The name is, apparently, of long date – possibly as far as the 11th century Croisade-related pogroms that ended with the expulsion of France’s 110,000 Jews by King Philippe Le Bel in 1306.” ‘
The “long date” of the name means nothing in and of itself — as you noted, it could be a commemorative/mourning name, not a celebratory name. Additionally, their history seems a bit confused — either intentionally, or because they don’t know any better, but it makes for a convenient fiction. The pogroms that occurred around the time of the launching of the First Crusade were principally in the Rhineland, not in France, and were not part of the First Crusade itself, but were conducted by groups of people who were not connected to the Crusade called by Pope Urban II (the fact that the most noted pogroms occurred in 1096, three years before the Crusaders of the First Crusade departed for Jerusalem, should tip folks off that there is something wrong with the received wisdom — the US Holocaust Museum perpetuates the same fiction, or at least it did when I visited there a decade or so ago). These pogroms were widely condemned by church authorities at the time, and, in fact, in many cases it was the Church who protected Jews from the mob (I believe it was in Mainz where the archbishop let the Jews into the cathedral in order to save them). These facts are rarely, if ever mentioned. It is also more than a bit of a stretch to connect the pogroms of mobs in the late eleventh century to the expulsion in 1306 — the Jews of France were, unfortunately, a soft and rich target, and their expulsion had more to do with the money they had than anything else (see also the Templars, who were treated the same way for the same reason by the same French king, despite being Christian knights).
Christianity, and especially the Catholic Church, has many sins properly laid at its door with regard to treatment of the Jews, and in no way am I an apologist for any of those sins. But bad and inaccurate history particularly annoys me.
I look forward to your upcoming post on the apparent (supposed?) surge of antisemitism in France. I, too, have noticed that the hysteria has been accompanied by gratuitous French-bashing and is largely driven by Americans (the articles I have seen about it in the English-language Israeli press all seem to be written by Americans as well). I have tried to argue with friends that there is an important distinction between “The French are anti-Semites,” and, “There are certain communities in France that seem to be prone to virulent strains of antisemitism”. It is an important difference. What’s more, given the rise of virulent anti-Arab racism in Israel, with calls for genocide and slaughter from people with far more power in Israel than any of the vocal anti-Semites in France, I recall the words of an ancient rabbi — Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own?
To borrow your phrase, à suivre.
Thanks a lot for that comment! That was informative.
DMH: Good comment. The Wiesenthal Center letter seems to have been sent on the initiative on its director of international relations, Shimon Samuels, who contributes periodic blog posts on France to the Times of Israel website, that may be seen here.
Thx. Good to know.
My thx was to Arun but also to DHMCarver (I hadn’t seen the comment until I re-opened this page.)
I have no facts to offer but when I read DHMCarver’s hopeful (even plaintive) “it could be a commemorative/mourning name, not a celebratory name” I had to smile (grimly).
Are there ANY commemorations — ANYWHERE in all of Europe prior to end of WW2 or maybe the Dreyfus affair– of past Jewish murders? Question asked seriously.
On monuments or commemorations of Jewish murders in centuries past and that predate WWII, I wouldn’t know. As for France, I am not aware of any Jews prior to WWII who suffered violent death on account of being Jews, at least after the Middle Ages, so would be surprised indeed if such monuments existed.
While I’m thinking of it, do you know of memorials erected in the US prior to the mid 20th century that commemorated murdered blacks or American Indians?
And also while I’m at it, what’s the point of these questions anyway?
The point of my question was a direct response DHMCarver’s statement “it could be a commemorative/mourning name, not a celebratory name”. I was asking a followup question about plausibility.
As to appropriate commemoration (post middle ages & prior to WW2) while he didn’t suffer death, it seems that a commemoration for Capt. Dreyfus would be an obviously decent thing to do.
Here’s your memorial to Capt. Dreyfus, in Paris’s 6th arrondissement, at the corner of Bd Raspail & Rue Notre-Dame-des-Champs.
Bad, bad French people. Anti-Bush, unreformed in the ways of austerity, led by a lazy potentate, and now antisemitic… Tsk tsk tsk…
Glass half full comment: this raw might decide some people to look at the origins of this burg’s name. Possible funding for a historian somewhere!
Americans who are denouncing France for being ‘antisemitic’ are the same who called the French ‘cheese eating surrender monkeys’ back in ’03. Any excuse to bash France…
I don’t think so at all. For one thing there simply is not a lot of France-bashing in the USA. No one cares about France. Jews are genuinely concerned about antisemitism in France, as they are with Sweden and Norway, and it has nothing to do with bashing anyone because of nationality.
Moreover, the statements (France = ‘antisemitic’ vs French = ‘cheese eating surrender monkeys’) come from different political clusters. More importantly, one, the former, has enough truth to make it impossible to discount while the latter was Bush 2 silliness.
France has had an ancient tradition (hardly unique of course) of antisemitism, it still exists — you realize that “Dreyfus as wicked” still has resonance among right wing French!?! — and is compounded now by its large Arab population.
Thanks Arun and commenters for this very sane post and comments.
Good post, Arun.
I regularly receive links to articles from Americans pointing out various incidents of anti-semitism in France which simply come of out nowhere. Best I can tell they are either indirect requests that I discuss such incidents in my blog or they are a counter to the many positive things I have to write about my adopted country. A strange business that I mostly ignore.
That anti-semitism exists in France is surely true. But then it existed in my home city of Seattle which has had some truly horrendous and sanguinary incidents of anti-semitism. This is a city mind you that is generally known for its liberality and openness. I am thinking, of course, of the Goldmark family and a shooting at a local Jewish center.
Victoria,
1. Yes Seattle has some — very little, really — antisemitism; there is conflation of antisemitism with antizionism (which in fact supports the Likudnik POV) but Seattle doesn’t have people rioting in the streets attacking Jews and synagogues as we see in France. Period. I know Seattle well. The Goldmark murders were in the 1980s and the Jewish Federation murders were in 2006. Both murderers were lone individuals. (There is no doubt on that last point).
2. Are you saying that “various incidents of anti-semitism in France which simply come of out nowhere” means that the reports in the NYT, BBC are just lies?
3. And btw, very little of the discussion about French antisemitism are anti-French. In fact it’s not just a French problem. Sweden too, Hungary. Britain.
DMS, More perhaps than you might think. I grew up in Seattle. Open anti-semitism was rare. What was said en famille or between friends was another matter. Enough so that I have never ever doubted that anti-semitism is alive and well.
Sorry for the lack of clarity. When I said “come out of nowhere” I meant that for the life of me I can’t determine why these people are sending me these articles. It’s not a topic I tackle on my blog, I don’t work with any organization that is interested in such things and though I am generally concerned because I live here and any act of hate be it against immigrants or any ethnic or religious
group is a serious matter that I should be aware of, I am not personally concerned and don’t do any advocacy in this area.
So I really am at a loss when I see emails in my inbox with links to articles from American news sources about anti-semitism in France.
What, pray tell, am I to do with this information? Oddly enough, because they are coming from American sources I tend to take them less seriously. I no longer trust the home country media on ANY topic.
Nice blog, yours, Victoria.
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Dms1999. It’s been a slow summer but getting back into writing again. Thank you for your kind words. Helps me to shake off the summer and get back to tickling the keys again. All the best to you.
Bonne continuation, Victoria 😉
A quick search of http://www.ign.fr gives:
– two “la Mort à l’âne”
– one “La mort aux bêtes”
Which I would never translate as “Death to the animals”.
Sure, I would have not liked to be the animals (nor the jews) mentioned when the events at the origin of the name unfolded. But I have no Idea if it was the consequences of a flash, or exhaustion, accident, fire, pogrom…
In nay case, “La mort aux Juifs ” seems to have disappeared from the results the IGN search function , at least of today.
Now the next “tempête dans un verre d’eau”: Will the SPA – PETA ask for the cancellation of the above names?
Sorry, my English is apparently as half-baked as the French of the Simon Wiesenthal Center. I meant “lightning”, no flash.
And let’s add water or food poisoning, and so on and so on.