Something rotten in the land of tricolor

While France is the origin of the principles of modern democracy, it has also shown a disturbing affinity for tyranny.

Martin Sherman | November 5, 2024

Eiffel Tower. Photo by Faygie Holt.

“I have tried to lift France out of the mud. But she will return to her errors. … I cannot prevent the French from being French.” — Charles de Gaulle

Bizarre developments seem to be emerging in what is considered by many—rightly or wrongly—the home of modern democracy, for there appears to be a growing alignment between Paris and the tyrannical theocrats of Tehran, particularly over the fate of war-torn Lebanon.

Reuters reported that the speaker of the Iranian parliament, Mohammad Baqer Ghalibaf, was quoted in a recent interview with Le Figaro as saying his country would be ready to “negotiate” with France on the implementation of U.N. Resolution 1701, the very motion that failed so disastrously to bring stability to Lebanon following the 2006 Second Lebanon War.

Accordingly, it appears that Paris and Tehran view Lebanon not as an independent state with its own sovereign government but rather as a vassal state subordinate to them both.

This bilateral initiative, with its manifest disregard for Lebanon itself, drew a sharp rebuke from Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati, who stated that such a negotiation was the prerogative of the Lebanese state. In a rare and audacious reproach of Iran, he expressed “surprise” at Ghalibaf’s move, describing it as “blatant interference in Lebanese affairs” and an attempt to “establish a rejected guardianship over Lebanon.

Significantly, The Tehran Times, a regime-affiliated media channel, reported on an Oct. 12 telephone conversation from Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian to French President Emmanuel Macron devoted to increasing pressure on Israel to stop what he described as “genocide” and “war crimes” in Gaza and Lebanon. Pezeshkian praised the recent steps taken by the French government condemning Israeli actions in Lebanon and suspending arms shipments to the Israel Defense Forces, citing them as positive moves towards peace.

Complicit in suppression?

Another perturbing development has recently come to light following a two-year investigation by France 24 revealing that hunting cartridges made by the Franco-Italian ammunition manufacturer Cheddite were used during the violent crackdown on the 2022 “Woman, Life, Freedom” protests sparked by the death in police custody of Mahsa Amini, a young Kurdish-Iranian woman, arrested for not wearing hijab as required. Reportedly, 551 people died (including almost 70 children) as a result of the regime’s repression in the months that followed the initial uprising.

According to the France 24 probe, these cartridges are widely available across Iran—in stark violation of the 2011 sanctions imposed by the European Union. It appears that the ammunition may have been routed into Iran via Turkey, where Cheddite held shares in a weapons manufacturing company. Interestingly, similar munitions were reportedly used against Southern Azeris—an ethnic minority constituting nearly a third of Iran’s population—during the suppression of a protest against persecution, discrimination and erasure of Azerbaijani culture and language by the regime.

France’s aberrant conduct—as a power allegedly associated with the West, its values, and its objectives—is apparent elsewhere regarding the provision of arms.

Useless UNIFIL

Indeed, as I pointed out last November, French Defense Minister Sebastien Lecornu approved the delivery of several dozen French-made armored vehicles to the Lebanese Army, ostensibly to “assist them in their patrol missions within the country [so] it could coordinate well with UNIFIL [the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon] as tensions mount between Israel and Iran-backed Hezbollah in Southern Lebanon.” In other words, as i24-News remarked, France is providing armored personnel carriers to the Lebanese Army for use in the areas controlled by Hezbollah, despite previous knowledge that Western military equipment supplied to them has ended up in the hands of the Iranian terror proxy. As the ALMA think-tank warned, Hezbollah’s infiltration of the Lebanese Army, and its utilization of its infrastructure, materiel and personnel, implies there is a tangible risk that French equipment and armaments will end up being used against Israel.

French animosity toward Israel was also on display in Paris’s sharp rebuke of the IDF when it fired on UNIFIL positions in Southern Lebanon. France accused Israel of endangering UNIFIL personnel and preventing them from fulfilling their peacekeeping mandate—blithely ignoring that (a) the force has been an abysmal failure in keeping the peace in Lebanon; and (b) Israel urged that its troops evacuate the combat zone so as to avoid the risk of injury.

Paris’s pernicious policies

Further revelations of French anti-Israel bias have been exposed regularly over the last several months. In June, France’s Defense Ministry issued a decree banning Israeli participation in a premier weapons exhibition, Eurosatory. The fact the ban was struck down by the French judiciary did little to deter the Macron government from trying to impose an additional ban on Israeli companies from taking part in another event—Euronaval Salon, a naval defense fair scheduled to take place between Nov. 4 and Nov. 7. Israel has once again vowed to challenge this decision in French courts.

To top all this off, Macron, whose own country has been the victim of Islamist savagery, is—astonishingly—promoting an arms embargo against Israel for its military response to even greater Islamist savagery, in which 1,200 of its citizens were massacred and mutilated—the equivalent of almost 8,000 French citizens in proportion to its population, almost seven times that of Israel’s.

Sadly, Paris’s pernicious policies extend beyond the Middle East and into the Caucasus, where a perturbing convergence of Iranian and French objectives appears to be emerging. This centers largely around their approach towards Armenia, which for years functioned as a conduit for goods to Russia and Iran in contravention of the Western sanctions against those two countries.

Diverging from the West?

Of course, Armenia and its neighbor Azerbaijan have been bitter adversaries for decades, which periodically erupted into military conflagrations, specifically over the Armenia-dominated enclave of Nagorno Karabakh. However, since Azerbaijan’s decisive victory in 2023, there has been a spluttering peace process, which may hold out the promise of a lasting resolution of the hostility between the two countries. In this regard, some have suggested that France and Iran have a vested interest in undermining this process. Indeed, Azerbaijan has complained that Paris has been biased against it, regularly favoring Armenia, arguably because of the influence of the substantial Armenian diaspora in that country.

Moreover, there are growing ties between Armenia and Iran involving multi-billion dollar deals and military cooperation that have led to assessments that Armenia is becoming an Iranian proxy in the Caucasus. The tension between Tehran and Baku is hardly surprising. After all, Azerbaijan is Israel’s leading supplier of crude oil, an important commercial partner and a large importer of Israeli armaments. These cordial relations between the Jewish state and Azerbaijan, a Shia Muslim state, is an anathema to the Iranian regime, Israel’s most virulent enemy.

Iran is aware of the potential for closer ties with France. Indeed, earlier this year, the then-newly appointed Iranian ambassador to France stressed the importance of the ties between Tehran and Paris. According to informed sources, Iran perceives France as standing apart from the rest of the West—specifically the United States and its Anglophonic allies, including the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.

An affinity for tyranny?

It remains to be seen if the recent events in the Middle East and Israel’s resounding successes against Iran and its emasculated proxies cause Paris to consider recharting its ill-advised course. Of course, in assessing this issue, it would be prudent to remember France has a history of an affinity for tyranny.

After all, it was not only the source of the noble ideal of Liberté, Égalité and Fraternité but also of the home of the Vichy government that willing collaborated with Nazi Germany, the all-time tyranny of tyrannies.

November 6, 2024 | 6 Comments »

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  1. EvRe

    I’m sure you wouldn’t remember but many years ago a movie was made about Emile Zola. The famous actor of the time was Paul Mini, who was a Yid and made his name in the Yiddish Theatre. He also did a life of Louis Pasteur and other famous people.

    I recall it as being very good,. It may be even on Youtube. I saw several of his movies, all excellent.
    As a child, and a devout movie goer, I even saw George Arliss in several great films including The Life Of D’Israeli, of whom he looked the “spitting image”.

  2. @Edgar G. Thank you, I was thinking of Zola when I wrote what I did. He played a vital role in turning the tide of Jew hatred and scapegoating by coming out openly in the newspaper and naming names and stating facts. In doing so, he supported Dreyfus and the Dreyfus family, and supported the officer who spent years trying to clear Dryefus’ name and bring the criminals to justice. I think Zola was sentenced to time in jail for writing the truth.

    In the end Dreyfus was exonerated, but the pain and suffering his imprisonment caused him was incalculable.

    Before reading that book, I had no idea how socially acceptable antisemitism was in France during this period. I knew that antisemitism in Austria was rife during this period having read about Freud’s life. What struck me was the people of the time, e.g. men in the army in which Dreyfus served, had difficulty experiencing Jews as human, and they could not see Jews as deserving of as good a life as they lived. It was very painful reading.

  3. LEBANON was for many years part of the French Mandate afterWW1, and since then, even being independent , there was always a lose connection. almost like a friendly perpetual client state.

    A poston this issue said that Napoleon emancipated the Jews. As well as the doctrine “Liberty Equality Fraternity”, he had the idea that Jews were very wealthy and wanted citizens of such wealth. He also broke down and opened all Ghettos across Europe, wherever he prevailed. A great man.

  4. Napoleon Bonaparte emancipated the Jews and introduced other ideas of freedom from the French Revolution in countries that he conquered during the Napoleonic Wars1234. He allowed Jews to be citizens and serve in the army but took a direct hand in Jewish affairs2. He abolished laws that limited Jews’ rights to property, worship, and to take part in a greater range of occupations3. Napoleon even designated Judaism as one of the official religions of France3. He declared France the homeland of the Jews, after it became obvious, he could not establish their national home in Palestine5.

  5. France has had a shocking history of antisemitism during various periods of her history.

    For instance during the 1890’s and early 1900’s antisemitism was normalized culturally. The Dreyfus affair was an example of scapegoating of a Jewish man in the French armed services by the top generals in the army. He was accused of being a spy for Germany, when in fact, the real spy for Germany was kept secret, and Dreyfus was convicted without due process by virtue of a secret meeting between the judges and the top generals, while Dreyfus and his attorney were not allowed to see the evidence used to convict him. He was sent to Devil’s island and at one point was put in chains. After the efforts of one officer to find out the truth about Dreyfus made possible Dreyfus’ return to court, he appeared in court looking like an old man, with white hair and a terribly weakened body while his age was just 39. The extent to which these generals were willing to lie to cover up their scapegoating and the fact that they let the real spy go free was shocking, and also it was also shocking to me to learn that the average man in the military in those days was antisemitic. They believed that a Jew by virtue of being a Jew could not be trusted to be patriotic. They supported the generals and expressed outrage at the legal efforts to clear Dreyfus’ name. *

    Now we have in Macron and France a revisiting of the old and ugly hatred toward Jews that was revealed by the Dreyfus affair and by the Vichy Government’s tyrannical association with and submission to Nazi Germany.

    The motivations of Macron appear to be his own personal antisemitism but also the need to placate the Muslims of France who show great hatred and loathing for Jews. Thus he went out of his way to publicize the refusal to admit the Israeli military to the French Defense Ministry’s weapons exhibition. As if that were not enough he was in favor of an arms embargo against Israel while Israel is fighting an existential war.

    I do not know what makes the French uniquely vulnerable to the antisemitism virus. It is true that the background context for the Dreyfus affair was an extremely upsetting military loss to the Germans of the territory of Alsace in 1870. Feelings of inferiority often lead to a desire to blame some other group as the “inferior” one. Similarly when World War II began, the French were once again humiliated by the rapidity of the German advance, while the French had no troops in reserve on which to rely; thus the Germans once again achieved a crushing defeat of the French on the battlefield. During WWII there likewise was a great deal of antisemitism in France both before and after the establishment of the Vichy Government.

    *An Officer and a Spy, by Robert Harris