Thousands of marchers joined French lawmakers in Paris on Sunday to condemn a surge in anti-Semitism in France during the conflict in the Gaza Strip, but arguments over political participation clouded an intended show of unity.
The protest, called by the leaders of France's two houses of parliament, was prompted by a three-fold increase in the number of anti-Semitic incidents compared with the whole of 2022, according to French authorities, since the October 7 Hamas attack on Israel.
"Our order of the day today is... the total fight against anti-Semitism which is the opposite of the values of the republic," Senate speaker Gerard Larcher, who organised the demonstration with lower house speaker Yael Braun-Pivet, told broadcaster LCP before the marchers set off.
Political figures, including Prime Minister Élisabeth Borne and former presidents François Hollande and Nicolas Sarkozy, headed the march, holding a banner with the slogan "For the Republic, against anti-Semitism". They led several renditions of the French national anthem.
Police estimated 105,000 people had taken part in Sunday's march.
More than 3,000 police and gendarmes were deployed to maintain security.
"We had grandparents who escaped being transported to the concentration camps, luckily they aren't here to see that (anti-Semitism) is back," said Laura Cohen, a marcher in her 30s.
"We shouldn't have to hide in 2023," she added, saying her family planned to remove their name from the intercom in their building and the mezuzah, a Jewish religious object, from their door.
Around 500,000 Jewish people live in France, making up Europe's largest community.
Earlier Sunday, thousands of people gathered in major French cities including Lyon, Nice and Strasbourg behind the same slogan as the Paris march: "For the Republic, against anti-Semitism".
"Everyone should feel like it's their business" to combat anti-Jewish feeling, France's chief rabbi Haim Korsia told broadcaster Radio J.
Hamas's shock October 7 attack killed about 1,200 people, mostly civilians, in Israel, according to Israeli officials, while the military says 240 people were taken hostage.
The Israeli air and ground campaign in response has left more than 11,000 people in Gaza dead, according to the Hamas-run health ministry.
France has recorded nearly 1,250 anti-Semitic acts since the attack.
'Confusion'
On the eve of the march, President Emmanuel Macron – who did not attend Sunday – condemned the "unbearable resurgence of unbridled anti-Semitism" in the country.
"A France where our Jewish citizens are afraid is not France," he wrote in a letter published in Saturday's Le Parisien.
Macron condemned the "confusion" surrounding the rally and said it was being "exploited" by some politicians for their own ends.
The hard-left France Unbowed (LFI) party boycotted the event which the far-right National Rally (RN) attended.
LFI leader Jean-Luc Melenchon rejected the march as a meeting of "friends of unconditional support for the massacre" of Palestinians in Gaza.
A separate rally against anti-Semitism that LFI organised in western Paris was disrupted on Sunday morning by counter-demonstrators.
Far-right leader Marine Le Pen – who also encountered protesters as she arrived – declared the march should also serve to stand against "Islamic fundamentalism", a pet theme of her anti-immigrant party.
The National Rally (RN) was known for decades as the National Front (FN), led by her father Jean-Marie Le Pen -- a convicted Holocaust denier.
Aiming to show the party has changed, "We are exactly where we should be" taking part in the march, Le Pen told reporters, calling any objections "petty political quibbles".
Communist leader Fabien Roussel said he would "not march alongside" the RN.
Other left-wing parties as well as youth and rights organisations marched behind a common banner separated from the far right.
'No posturing'
Prime Minister Borne said Sunday, "There is no place for posturing" at the march, writing on X that "this is a vital battle for national cohesion".
Borne's own father survived the Nazi death camp Auschwitz in occupied Poland, only to take his own life when she was 11.
Among the long list of recent anti-Semitic acts, Paris prosecutors are investigating an incident on October 31, when buildings in the city and suburbs were daubed with dozens of Stars of David.
The graffiti, which brought back memories of the Nazi occupation of Paris during World War II and deportation of Jews to death camps, was widely condemned.
The march took place a day after several thousand people demonstrated in Paris under the rallying cry "Stop the massacre in Gaza".
The left-wing organisers called for France to "demand an immediate ceasefire" between Israel and Hamas militants.
(FRANCE 24 with AFP and REUTERS)
