Anti-Semitism in France During the 1930s: Organisations, Personalities, and Propaganda

164 Pages·1983·2.054 MB·English

by  Paul J. Kingston

ANTI-SEMITISM IN FRANCE
DURING THE 1930s: ORGANISATIONS,
PERSONALITIES AND PROPAGANDA
University of Hull Press
Occasional Papers in Modern Languages
No. 14
General Editor: Brian Moloney
Professor of Italian in the
University of Hull
ANTI-SEMITISM IN FRANCE
DURING THE 1930s:
ORGANISATIONS, PERSONALITIES
AND PROPAGANDA
PAUL J. KINGSTON
Lecturer in French
University of Hull
UNIVERSITY OF HULL PRESS
1983
© The University of Hull 1983
ISBN 0 85958 440 2
ISSN 0078-3099
Phototypeset in 11 on 12 pt Baskerville
Printed in England by
Archibald and Johnsons Ltd.
Strawberry St. Ind. Est., Hull
North Humberside
CONTENTS
Preface vii
Abbreviations ix
Introduction 1
I Organisations and Personalities
(i) Introduction to the Police Report 7
(ii) The Police Report:‘La Propagande anti-juive’ 10
(iii) Reflections . . . . . . 65
II Propaganda
Introduction to Bagatelles pour un massacre. 75
(i) Jewish Identity . . . . 77
(ii) Assimilation . . . . 88
(iii) Communism and the Jews . 95
(iv) Anti-Semitism and Nationalism . 103
(v) Germany and the Threat of War . 117
(vi) Conspiracy and Anglophobia 121
(vii) Conclusion. . . . . 126
Chronology of Events 1933-1940 . 130
Biographical Sketch of Louis-Ferdinand Destouches (Céline) . 131
Notes 133
Bibliography 143
Index 148

PREFACE
The French Jewish community is, today, the largest in Western
Europe with some 650,000 members, and numerically it ranks
fourth in the world after its kindred communities in the United
States of America, the U.S.S.R. and Israel itself. The violence it has
suffered throughout history at the hands of anti-Semites continues
still, forty years after the abomination known as the Holocaust.
Paris in the 1980s has witnessed explosions and machine-gun attacks
against Jewish individuals, groups and buildings. The vicious
intensity of such attacks is greater than anything experienced since
the Second World War, with the bombing of a Jewish student
restaurant in March 1979; the indiscriminate spraying of bullets
against Jewish buildings, including a nursery and junior schools in
September 1980; the murder of four people in an explosion at the
synagogue in the rue Copernic, on 3 October 1980, and the
assassination of a Jewish couple who owned a travel agency, some
six weeks later. This register of anti-Semitic atrocities has had a
more recent entry - surpassing by its horrific violence all previous
incidents in Paris during this decade - the merciless killing of six
people in the rue des Rosiers, on 9 August 1982.
Although the political motivation behind many of these attacks
was entirely different from that which gave rise to incidents of anti-
Semitic violence in Paris during the 1930s, the act of victimisation of
innocents remains ever the same. Racism and the anti-Semitic
prejudice, in particular, thrive on ignorance; knowledge of past
manifestations of this evil may help to constitute a necessary
defensive barrier for any society which hopes to guarantee the
essential equality of all its citizens and to recognise and respect the
rights of others.
Readers of this study should note that the format and punctuation
of the Police Report which is included in Part I, have certain
Vll
Anti-Semitism in France
idiosyncracies which were present in the original, and, as it has been
decided to reproduce the document as faithfully as possible, these
anomalies have been allowed to stand. In some instances, for
example, the spacing between organisations or individuals listed by
the report varies noticeably. As there is not any possibility of
establishing definitively if such spacing were used to indicate the
significance attributed to a specific group, etc., the presentation of
the original document has been observed.
Bagatelles pour un massacre, which is examined in Part II, was signed
by Louis-Ferdinand Destouches; however, for the purposes of this
study, the author will be referred to by his better known nom-de-
plume, ‘Céline’. It should be noted that the usage of square brackets
in quotations in Part II signifies the omission of text, whereas ellipsis
points without brackets stand as in the original text where they were
used by Céline for stylistic effect.
I wish to record my thanks for the advice and encouragement I
received from Emeritus Professor J. C. Ireson and the late Professor
C. E. Pickford, both of the University of Hull, during the
preparation of this book.
I should like to thank Dr Joyce Bellamy for her patient and precise
work on the setting of the final manuscript.
UNIVERSITY OF HULL PAUL J. KINGSTON
MAY 1983
Vlll
ABBREVIATIONS
ACIP Actes du Colloque International de Paris (27-30 juillet
1976)
A.P. Archives de Police (de Paris)
A.S. Au Sujet
C.E.A. Centre d’études antibolcheviques
L. I.C.A. Ligue Internationale Contre l’Antisémitisme
M. L.G.O. Mouvement Le Grand Occident
N. R.F. Nouvelle Revue française
O. P.N. Office de Propagande Nationale
P. F.N.C. Parti Français National Communiste
P.U.F. Parti Unitaire Français
R.G. Renseignements Généraux
R. I.S.S. La Revue Internationale des Sociétés Secrètes
S. N.L. Société du Nouveau Littré
XXX Anonymous works
ix