By ANGELA CHARLTON, Associated Press Writer Sun May 6, 7:05 PM ET
PARIS - Nicolas Sarkozy, a blunt and uncompromising pro-American conservative, was elected president of France Sunday with a mandate to chart a new course for an economically sluggish nation struggling to incorporate immigrants and their children.
Sarkozy defeated Socialist Segolene Royal by 53-47 percent with 85 percent turnout, according to near-total results. It was a decisive victory for Sarkozy's vision of freer markets and toughness on crime and immigration, over Royal's gentler plan for preserving cherished welfare protections, including a 35-hour work week that Sarkozy called "absurd."
"The people of France have chosen change," Sarkozy told cheering supporters in a victory speech that sketched out a stronger global role for France and renewed partnership with the United States.
There were few reports of unrest, despite fears that the impoverished suburban housing projects, home to Arab and African immigrants and their French-born children, would erupt again at the victory of a man who labeled those responsible for rioting in 2005 as "scum." That abrasive style raised doubts over whether Sarkozy, himself the son of a Hungarian refugee, could truly unite the increasingly diverse and polarized nation.
Sarkozy pledged in his victory speech to be president "of all the French, without exception." But that task will not be easy. The 52-year-old former interior minister inherits a nation losing faith in itself, paralyzed by worries over globalization, bitter at American dominance and saddled with social tensions.
Late Sunday, small bands of youths hurled stones and other objects at police at the Place de la Bastille in Paris, who fired volleys of tear gas.
For all his determination and talk of change, Sarkozy also is certain to face resistance from powerful unions to his plans to make the French work more and make it easier for companies to hire and fire.
"Like Thatcher in Britain, like Reagan in the United States, Sarkozy will change things," said supporter Thierry Gauvert, 55.
The White House said
President Bush had called to congratulate Sarkozy, who is largely untested in foreign policy but reached out to the United States in his victory speech, an indication of his desire to break from the trans-Atlantic tension of the Chirac era.
Sarkozy also made it clear that France would remain an independent voice.
The United States, he declared, can "count on our friendship," but he added that "friendship means accepting that friends can have different opinions."
He urged the United States to take the lead on climate change and said the issue would be a priority for France.
"A great nation, like the United States, has a duty not to block the battle against global warming but — on the contrary — to take the lead in this battle, because the fate of the whole of humanity is at stake," Sarkozy said.
In some European capitals, Sarkozy's victory inspired hope that he might lend a decisive hand to efforts to salvage the
European Union's hopes of greater integration, largely on ice since French and Dutch voters rejected a proposed EU constitution in 2005.
Royal's program seemed more in line with the policies pursued under the outgoing Jacques Chirac — who is from Sarkozy's own party, the Union for a Popular Movement. Chirac, 74, held the presidency for 12 years but failed repeatedly to push through reforms.
The handover of power ushers in a president from a new generation, who has no memory of World War II and waged the country's first high-octane Internet campaign.
Royal, an unmarried mother of four, would have been France's first female president. Her defeat could throw her party into disarray, with splits between those who say it must remain firm to its leftist traditions and others who want a shift to the political center like socialist parties elsewhere in Europe.
Conceding minutes after polls closed, Royal said her campaign had launched a "profound renewal of political life, of its methods and of the left ... What we tried to do for France will bear fruit, I am sure."
Cracks immediately started appearing in the Socialist Party, which now must try to regroup ahead of June legislative elections that Sarkozy's party must win to give him the majority he needs to reform.
Dominique Strauss-Kahn, a Socialist former finance minister, noted that it was his party's third consecutive defeat in presidential elections.
"The left has never been so weak, because the French left has still not renewed itself," he said.
Sarkozy — for whom the presidency has been a near-lifelong quest — will formally take over Chirac on the very last day of his term, May 16. Sarkozy aide Francois Fillon, a favorite to be the prime minister, said that for a few days from Monday, Sarkozy plans "to withdraw to somewhere in France to decompress a little" and to prepare his government team.
___
Associated Press writers Jenny Barchfield and John Leicester in Paris and Jamey Keaten in Clichy-sous-Bois contributed to this report.
Isn't this proof that the officials are selected not elected :
Last edited by edisme on Fri Jan 18, 2008 8:18 pm; edited 1 time in total
The French ambassador to Israel told The Jerusalem Post on Monday that with the election of Nicolas Sarkozy as his country's next president, "there will be new progress and new steps forward in French-Israeli relations."
This progress, Ambassador Jean-Michel Casa quickly qualified, "would continue the deepening of ties between the two peoples over the past few years" under outgoing President Jacques Chirac, but, he hoped, "would also speed up that process."
But not everyone is as optimistic.
"I cannot believe that there will be perfect alignment between French foreign policy and [Sarkozy's] stances through the years," former ambassador to France Nissim Zvili told the Post.
"Despite the clear positions [in support of Israel] that he expressed as a government minister," Zvili said, "today, he must take into account France's interests in Arab countries, North Africa and the Third World.
"Even though his heart is closer to our positions, this won't translate directly into a French foreign policy that we would like to see."
Nevertheless, Casa's optimism seems to be shared by Israeli leaders. Likud chairman Binyamin Netanyahu called Sarkozy's electoral victory good news for Israeli-French relations on Sunday night, adding, "Sarkozy is a friend of Israel and a personal friend of mine. He wants to help Israel achieve true peace, and he understands our security needs well."
Vice Premier Shimon Peres also cited Sarkozy's friendship and added that his victory speech declaration that a European Union-like treaty would be implemented in the Middle East was a "very interesting" suggestion.
Casa and Zvili spoke to the Post at an inauguration ceremony for Israel's first French-Hebrew bilingual school on the Mikve Yisrael Agricultural School campus between Tel Aviv and Holon, intended by its founders to be a conduit for French-Israeli cultural rapprochement.
"France has a willingness and a desire to develop and support Francophone culture all over the world," Casa said. "In Israel, there is a special dimension to this because of a permanent stream of French Jewish immigrants and French-speaking immigrants into the country. We are neutral toward this aliya, of course, but since it's there, we want to help these immigrants maintain their French culture and language."
Education Minister Yuli Tamir said the bilingual school would also help with the integration of adolescent French olim, providing them a comfortable bridge "from culture to culture, from language to language."
For Zvili, the joint work represented by the new school holds even greater promise for cultural integration. "I hope this project will help bring about the French government's inclusion of Israel in the Francophonie," he said, referring to the Paris-based organization of 55 member states with French linguistic or cultural connections.
"Fifteen percent of Israel's population speaks French," he said, "more than in many other countries that are part of that organization."
The first Jewish agricultural school in the Land of Israel, Mikve Yisrael had a French connection from the start. It was founded in 1870 on land the Turkish authorities gave to the Alliance Israelite Universelle.
The location is rich in history and symbolism, with a focus on teaching French culture and language from its beginning. And it is important in Zionist history.
As Tamir said at the ceremony, "This is where Israel's educational system got its start."
The new school, slated to begin open in September, will teach a French curriculum alongside the Israeli one, and will offer matriculation exams recognized by both countries.
Commentary
By Dick Eastman
olfriend@nwinfo.net
5-8-7
The Rothschild Zionists have captured France.
Sarkozy's father is Hungarian, his mother a Greek Jewess -- thus he is Jewish by Jewish reckoning from the mother's bloodline.
He won by clear game-theoretic loading of the French election process (very sophisticated "political science") with an array of fake candidates (three Trotskyite candidates to divide the traditional French left, for example) calculated (from high-speed computers and polling information) to divide and run into ditches all opposition to Zionist globalization.
Sarkozy will disolve France as a sovereign nation into the European Union where sovereignty rests with the Zionist merchant bankers who pick the leaders of the EU. As the monetary system is taken out of the hands of the people's national governments with the international (read " internationalists' ") Euro -- so now all political power will be in the hands of the chosen's chosen.
And the media is now saying -- with great satisfaction -- that Sarkozy will now move France "closer to the United States" -- meaning exactly what? Whose policy is the policy of the United States today? Whose but the international Zionist merchant bankers' ?
Sakozy promises that France will join Europe and will be more active and aggressive in fighting for what "we" (who?) believe in around the world. This, of course, means that when Hillary Clinton calls for more troops to occupy Iran -- French troops will be forthcoming.
It also means that everything Zionist internationalist Sakozy says will now be trumpeted on our internationalist Zionist monopoly media.
Isn't it wonderful that the great countries of "Western Civilization" all agree now? Isn't it wonderful to know that "freedom" will now be pushed around the world -- that Frenchmen will be joining your American sons and daughters in maintaining the international Zionist order wherever people rise up in revolt against debt slavery and international monopoly exploitation and bankers' puppet goverments. Can't you just wait for Frenchmen and Americans to liberate Venezuela from its "freedom hating" dictator, for example.
Which brings me to another point.
Sarkozy the Jew who represente himself as a Catholic -- reminds one of certain famous Democats and Republicans we all know. Remember how John Kerry discovered that he is a Jew after he was in government. Remember, Madeline Albright (recently honored every six minutes or so by Safeway in recordings piped into all their stores for national women's month) -- remember how she, like Sarkozy, advertized herself as a Catholic -- only to find out she has been attending the ruling-elite Episcopalian church throughout her adult life -- only to find out, after the Senate hearnings! -- that she was actually the daughter of one of Stalin's Jewish commisars.
Or take Al Gore -- whose daughter married into the Schiff merchant banking family -- a family that actually headed the Jewish community in the late 19th and early 20th century, Jacob Schiff sent here from Europe to control American banking -- and who will soon announce his run on the totally bogus issue of "global warming" (as if that is the only real issue worth discussing.) Of course, I like Ron Paul and Bob Bowman and I would work for either rather than have "Manchurian John" McCain or Hillary Clinton (whose husband, William Blyth is reputed to be the bastard of Winthrop Rockefeller, governor boss of Arkansas in the 1940s -- -- (there is a strong Rockefeller look to his face in my opinion.)
At any rate, Sarkozy is going to bring France into the European Union just like the next President will bring the US into the North American Union. Notice, by the way, that you don't hear Hillary Clinton arguing angainst the American Union. Why? Does she think opposing the Union would hurt her changes? Hell no, of course. Then it must be because she supports the disenfranchisment of the American people to an international goverment run by Zionist Jew bankers. (The North American Union will be run by people appointed by the bankers to carry out the bankers' policies -- you will have as much say as you have in the workings of the United Nations (do you remember ever voting for your representative at the United Nations?) Replacing government by the people by "upgrading" to goverment by the bankers -- sans consititution, sans representation.
By the way -- Sen. Lieberman ran for Vice President -- guess why? Why did George H. W. Bush accept the Vice Presidency from Ronald Reagan? Remember "Manchurian John" Hinkley Jr.? Albert Gore was merely a poster boy for environmentalism to attract voters brainwashed by "pc" environmentalist indoctrination in the schools -- he was the catnip for the kitties. But you say the election of 2000 was rigged by the Republicans? I don't think so. I think the entire "hanging chad" dispute was a staged super distraction. It was during the distraction of the "hanging chad" dispute over who won the 2000 election that the entire derivatives industry was deregulated by Congress. This issue had not been brought up before the crisis.
One more thing, Ron Paul is for elimiating the Federal Reserve and he has spoken of a gold standard. This is not the solution to control by the money power. A Hillary Clinton or Manchurian John can carry out the same monetary policies that the Fed has been conducting. What is needed is a complete revision of the entire banking and credit system -- and a new policy directed by representatives of the people, not puppets of the merchant bankers. Ron Paul has not made clear that he understands the problem of a population deprived of purchasing power and pushed into debt slavery -- a gold standard would not fix that -- rather it would put us on the 19th -century course of deflation and scarce money which is always good for the bond holding class -- but death to the indepted class -- but the g. s. would be a great windfall to those now holding all the gold. I would feel much better if Paul were a Douglas social creditor.
Good government is like good religion -- it is only understood and believed-in by people too low on the power pyramid to ever have the chance to affect things. And if the people anywhere rebel -- there is always some President Bush or Prime Minister Tony Blair or President icolas Sarkozy or "pro-market" "pro-deregulation" "pro-American" Chancellor Angela Dorthea Merkel (nee Kasner) of Germany to send in the troops to "defend your freedom" -- and of course if all that fails the merchant bankers can really get tough and bring in their real backup -- the Chinese Peoples Liberation Army to ensure that internationalist reforms are not rejected by anti-Semtic terrorists -- the "war on terror" being something that the globalists tell us will go on for many generations.
Now I will make a deal with you -- I will learn to spell and to write an organized essay if you learn to observe and think and move your ass when you are about to be eaten alive. Is it a deal?
Warm regard to all,
Dick Eastman
Yakima, Washington
In an interview Nicolas Sarkozy gave in 2004, he expressed an extraordinary understanding of the plight of the Jewish people for a home:
"Should I remind you the visceral attachment of every Jew to Israel, as A second mother homeland? There is nothing outrageous about it. Every Jew carries within him a fear passed down through generations, and he knows that if one day he will not feel safe in his country, there will always be a place that would welcome him. And this is Israel." (From the book " *La République, les religions, l'espérance*", interviews with Thibaud Collin and Philippe Verdin.)
Sarkozy's sympathy and understanding is most probably a product of his upbringing; it is well known that Sarkozy's mother was born to the Mallah family, one of the oldest Jewish families of Salonika, Greece. Additionally,many may be surprised to learn that his yet-to-be-revealed family History involves a true and fascinating story of leadership, heroism and survival.It remains to be seen whether his personal history will affect his foreign policy and France's role in the Middle East conflict.
In the 15th century, the Mallah family (in Hebrew: messenger or angel) escaped the Spanish Inquisition to Provence, France and moved about one hundred years later to Salonika. In Greece, several family members became prominent Zionist leaders, active in the local and national political, economic, social and cultural life. To this day many Mallahs are still active Zionists around the world.
Sarkozy's grandfather, Aron Mallah, nicknamed Benkio, was born in 1890. Beniko's uncle Moshe was a well-known Rabbi and a devoted Zionist who, In 1898 published and edited "El Avenir", the leading paper of the Zionist national movement in Greece at the time. His cousin, Asher, was a Senator in the Greek Senate and in 1912 he helped guarantee the establishment of The Technion — the elite technological university in Haifa, Israel. In 1919 he was elected as the first President of the Zionist Federation of Greece And he headed the Zionist Council for several years. In the 1930's he helped Jews flee to Israel, to which he himself immigrated in 1934. Another of Beniko's cousins, Peppo Mallah, was a philanthropist for Jewish causes who served in the Greek Parliament, and in 1920 he was offered, but declined, the position of Greece's Minister of Finance. After the establishment of the State of Israel he became the country's first diplomatic envoy to Greece.
In 1917 a great fire destroyed parts of Salonika and damaged the family estate. Many Jewish-owned properties, including the Mallah's, were expropriated by the Greek government. Jewish population emigrated from Greece and much of the Mallah family left Salonika to France, America and Israel. Sarkozy's grandfather, Beniko, immigrated to France with his mother. When in France Beniko converted to Catholicism and changed his name to Benedict in order to marry a French Christian girl named Adèle Bouvier.
Adèle and Benedict had two daughters, Susanne and Andrée. Although Benedict integrated fully into French society, he remained close to his Jewish family, origin and culture. Knowing he was still considered Jewish by blood, during World War II he and his family hid in Marcillac la Croisille in the Corrèze region, western France.
During the Holocaust, many of the Mallahs who stayed in Salonika or moved to France were deported to concentration and extermination camps. In total, fifty-seven family members were murdered by the Nazis. Testimonies reveal that several revolted against the Nazis and one, Buena Mallah, was the subject of Nazis medical experiments in the Birkenau concentration camp.
In 1950 Benedict's daughter, Andrée Mallah, married Pal Nagy Boscay Sarkozy, a descendent of a Hungarian aristocratic family. The couple Had three sons — Guillaume, Nicolas and François. The marriage failed and they divorced in 1960, so Andrée raised her three boys close to their grandfather, Benedict. Nicolas was especially close to Benedict, who was like a father to him. In his biography Sarkozy tells he admired his grandfather, and through hours spent of listening to his stories of the Nazi occupation, the "Maquis" (French resistance), De Gaulle and the D-day, Benedict bequeathed to Nicolas his political convictions.
Sarkozy's family lived in Paris until Benedict's death in 1972, at which point they moved to Neuilly-sur-Seine to be closer to the boys' father, Pal (who changed his name to Paul) Sarkozy. Various memoirs accounted Paul as a father who did not spend much time with the kids or help the family monetarily. Nicolas had to sell flowers and ice cream in order to pay for his studies. However, his fascination with politics led him to become the city's youngest mayor and to rise to the top of French and world politics. The rest is history.
It may be a far leap to consider that Sarkozy's Jewish ancestry may have any bearing on his policies vis-à-vis Israel. However, many expect Sarkozy's presidency to bring a dramatic change not only in France's domestic affairs, but also in the country's foreign policy in the Middle-East. One cannot overestimate the magnitude of the election of the first French President born after World War II, whose politics seem to represent a new dynamic after decades of old-guard Chirac and Mitterrand. There is even a reason to believe that Sarkozy, often mocked as "the American friend" and blamed for 'ultra-liberal' worldviews, will lean towards a more Atlanticist policy. Nevertheless, there are several reasons that any expectations for a drastic change in the country's Middle East policy, or foreign policy in general, should be downplayed.
First, one must bear in mind that France's new president will spend the lion's share of his time dealing with domestic issues such as the country's stagnated economy, its social cohesiveness and the rising integration-related crime rate. When he finds time to deal with foreign affairs, Sarkozy will have to devote most of his energy to protecting France's standing in an ever-involved European Union. In his dealings with the US, Sarkozy will most likely prefer to engage on less explosive agenda-items than the Middle-East.
Second, France's foreign policy stems from the nation's interests, rooted in reality and influenced by a range of historic, political, strategic and economic considerations. Since Sarkozy's landing at the Elysée on May 16 will not change those, France's foreign policy ship will not tilt so quickly under a new captain.
Third reason why expectations for a drastic change in France's position in the Middle-East may be naïve is the significant weight the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs exerts over the country's policies and agenda. There, non-elected bureaucrats tend to retain an image of Israel as a destabilizing element in the Middle-East rather then the first line of defense of democracy. Few civil servants in Quai d'Orsay would consider risking France's interests or increasing chances for "a clash of civilizations" in order to help troubled Israel or Palestine to reach peace.
It is a fair to predict that France will stay consistent with its support in establishing a viable Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital, existing side by side with a peaceful Israel. How to get there, if at all, will not be set by Sarkozy's flagship but rather he will follow the leadership of the US and the EU. Not much new policy is expected regarding Iran, on which Sarkozy has already voiced willingness to allow development of civilian nuclear capabilities, alongside tighter sanctions on any developments with military potency.
One significant policy modification that could actually come through under Sarkozy is on the Syrian and Lebanese fronts. The new French president is not as friendly to Lebanon as was his predecessor, furthermore, as the Minister of the Interior, Sarkozy even advocated closer ties between France and Syria. Especially if the later plays the cards of talking-peace correctly, Sarkozy may increase pressure on Israel to evacuate the Golan Heights in return for a peace deal with Assad.
Despite the above, although Sarkozy's family roots will not bring France closer to Israel, the presidents' personal Israeli friends may. As a Minister of Interior, Sarkozy shared much common policy ground with Former Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu. The two started to develop A close friendship not long ago and it is easy to observe similarities not only in their ideology and politics, but also in their public image. If Netanyahu returns to Israel's chief position it will be interesting to see whether their personal dynamic will lead to a fresh start for Israel and France, and a more constructive European role in the region.
Raanan Eliaz is a former Director at the Israeli National Security Council and the Hudson Institute, Washington D.C . He is currently a Ph.D. Candidate at the Catholic University of Leuven, Belgium, and a consultant on European-Israeli Affairs. He wrote this column for European Jewish Press, a Brussels-based pan-European news agency.
Sarkozy's proposal for Mediterranean bloc makes waves
By Katrin Bennhold
Published: May 10, 2007
PARIS: A proposal by Nicolas Sarkozy to gather the European, Middle Eastern, and North African countries of the strategic Mediterranean rim into an economic community along the lines of the early European Union has begun making waves even before the president-elect takes office.
The initiative, outlined by Sarkozy in a campaign speech in February, went largely unnoticed until he repeated it in his electoral victory address Sunday evening. Plans are still being drawn up, Sarkozy's aides said Thursday, but even at this early stage the proposal has cascading implications for the region.
Such a union, even if primarily economic, would necessarily involve the member countries in discussions of controversial issues like Turkish membership in the European Union and illegal immigration via North Africa. It would bring Israel and its Arab neighbors into a new assembly that Sarkozy apparently hopes could tackle the intractable problem of Middle East peace.
Initial reactions have ranged from enthusiasm in Spain to cautious approval in Israel to outrage in Turkey, which sees the proposal as a ploy to keep it out of the European Union.
"This cannot be an alternative to Turkish membership in the EU," Egeman Bagis, the chief foreign policy adviser to Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey, said in a telephone interview.
"Every country that started membership negotiations with the EU has completed them," he continued. "If Turkey becomes the only exception, it would send a very bad message to the world's 1.5 billion Muslims."
The "Turkish problem" is clearly in Sarkozy's sights. He campaigned on a platform of keeping Turkey out of the EU, maintaining that the large Muslim nation is part of Asia Minor, not Europe.
The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is also on Sarkozy's mind. In his speech Sunday, he described the Mediterranean as the region "where everything is being played out." He added: "We must surmount all the hatreds to make space for a great dream of peace and civilization."
The notion of regional cooperation in the Mediterranean is ambitious but more timely than ever, diplomats and foreign policy observers said. North Africa is an important transit route for illegal immigrants heading for Europe. The site of resurgent Islamic terrorism, it is home to substantial natural gas reserves.
Sarkozy, who takes office next week, has said that he wants the countries ringing the Mediterranean - Portugal, Spain, France, Italy, Greece, Cyprus, Malta, Turkey, Lebanon, Israel, Egypt, Libya, Tunisia, Algeria and Morocco - to form a council and hold regular summit meetings under a rotating presidency.
He wants to anchor regional cooperation in the fields of energy, security, counter-terrorism and immigration on a trade agreement, and create a Mediterranean Investment Bank, modeled on the European Investment Bank, that would help develop the economies on the eastern and southern edge of the region. He has offered French expertise on nuclear energy in return for access to North Africa's gas reserves.
"The time has come to build together a Mediterranean Union that will be the bridge between Europe and Africa," Sarkozy said in his victory speech Sunday.
In a campaign speech in the port city of Toulon in February, he said: "The Mediterranean is a key to our influence in the world. It's also a key for Islam that is torn between modernity and fundamentalism."
A Mediterranean Union would work closely with the European Union and might eventually form joint institutions with the 27-nation bloc. But it would be a separate organization, Sarkozy said in the Toulon speech.
In Spain, Juan Prat, ambassador at large for Mediterranean affairs, praised the proposal as a way to deal more effectively with new risks like immigration, terrorism and climate change.
"We are ready to work with him on this because we need to enhance the European-Mediterranean partnership," he said in a telephone interview.
In Israel, where Sarkozy's Toulon speech was circulated in diplomatic circles, the reaction was also positive. When Deputy Prime Minister Shimon Peres called Sarkozy on Monday to congratulate him on his election victory, he said that the idea of a Mediterranean Union was "very important" and that he was interested in discussing it further, diplomatic sources said.
A senior Israeli diplomat, who declined to be identified, said: "My feeling is that there is every reason to believe that Israel would be interested in this because it gives us another opportunity to have a dialogue with countries that we sometimes have difficulties holding a dialogue with."
The idea of a Mediterranean dialogue is not new. In 1995, the European Union launched the so-called Barcelona process, a framework for regular meetings among the union's members and other countries ringing the Mediterranean.
Sarkozy accused of working for Israeli intelligence
by Gamal Nkrumah
Sarkozy's bad week
As if his marital challenges were not enough cause for concern, "Sarco the Sayan" has suddenly emerged as the most infamous accolade of French President Nicolas Sarkozy. The influential French daily Le Figaro last week revealed that the French leader once worked for -- and perhaps still does, it hinted -- Israeli intelligence as a sayan (Hebrew for helper), one of the thousands of Jewish citizens of countries other than Israel who cooperate with the katsas (Mossad case-officers).
A letter dispatched to French police officials late last winter -- long before the presidential election but somehow kept secret -- revealed that Sarkozy was recruited as an Israeli spy. The French police is currently investigating documents concerning Sarkozy's alleged espionage activities on behalf of Mossad, which Le Figaro claims dated as far back as 1983. According to the author of the message, in 1978, Israeli prime minister Menachem Begin ordered the infiltration of the French ruling Gaullist Party, Union pour un Mouvement Populaire. Originally targeted were Patrick Balkany, Patrick Devedjian and Pierre Lellouche. In 1983, they recruited the "young and promising" Sarkozy, the "fourth man".
Ex-Mossad agent Victor Ostrovsky describes how sayanim function in By Way Of Deception: The Making and Unmaking of a Mossad Officer. They are usually reached through relatives in Israel. An Israeli with a relative in France, for instance, might be asked to draft a letter saying the person bearing the letter represents an organisation whose main goal is to help save Jewish people in the Diaspora. Could the French relative help in any way? They perform many different roles. A car sayan, for example, running a rental car agency, could help the Mossad rent a car without having to complete the usual documentation. An apartment sayan would find accommodation without raising suspicions, a bank sayan could fund someone in the middle of the night if needs be, a doctor sayan would treat a bullet wound without reporting it to the police.
And, a political sayan ? It's rather obvious what this could mean. The sayanim are a pool of people at the ready who will keep quiet about their actions out of loyalty to "the cause", a non-risk recruitment system that draws from the millions of Jewish people outside Israel.
Such talk sends chills down spines, especially Arab and Muslim ones. Indeed, the revelation did not go unnoticed in Arab capitals or come as much of a surprise. Paris can be a sunny place for shady people. When it comes to intelligence gathering on behalf of Israel, a question mark is immediately raised on the moral calibre of the person in question. But, how does this scandal influence France's foreign and domestic politics?
It is of symbolic significance that Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert was on a state visit to France in the immediate aftermath of Le Figaro 's exposé -- ostensibly to discuss Iran's nuclear agenda and the Palestinian question. Proud and prickly France under its supposedly savvy new president hopes to play a more prominent role in the perplexing world of Middle Eastern politics. On Monday, Sarkozy flew to Morocco, the ancestral home of many of France's Jewry, soon after his Mossad connection was made public. There is no clear evidence that the revelation is to make France any more unpopular in the Arab world than it already is, especially not in official circles.
On the domestic front, however, there are many conflicting considerations. The Jews of France now display a touch of the vapours, in sharp contrast to the conceited triumphalism with which they greeted his election: "we are persuaded that the new president will continue eradicating anti-Israeli resistance," Sammy Ghozlan, president of the Jewish Community of Paris pontificated soon after Sarkozy's election. France is home to 500,000 Jews, mostly Sephardic Jews originally from North Africa and Mediterranean countries.
Sarkozy's own maternal grandfather Aron Mallah, hailed from Salonika, Greece, and is said to have exercised considerable influence on his grandson. Even though raised as a Roman Catholic, "Sarkozy played a critical role in moving the French government to do what is necessary to address the ill winds that threaten the largest Jewish community in Western Europe," noted David Harris, the executive director of the American Jewish Committee. Sarkozy, after all, was a political product of the predominantly Jewish elite neighbourhood of Neuilly-sur-Seine, where he long served as mayor.
France's Muslim minority was far from surprised by Le Figaro 's revelations, even though some may have feigned disappointment. Others have been more forthright. "France is not run by Frenchmen, but by lackeys of the Zionist International who control the economy," lamented Radio Islam, of militant Islamist tendencies. When Sarkozy was France's minister of interior and clamped down hard on Muslim immigrants, calling mainly Muslim rioters "scum" in a widely-publicised interview, they retaliated by calling him "Sarkozy, sale juif [dirty Jew]". Obviously there is no love lost between the five million-strong French Muslim community, the largest in Western Europe, and the French president. He has grounds for concern. He assiduously courts the Israelis. That much is known.
In the scientific annals of French politics there is a cautionary tale of pantomime. French presidents are not always what they seem. There are, however, two key observations concerning Sarkozy. One, is Sarkozy's intention of implementing a "new social contract" between employers and employees, capital and labour. This smacks of Thatcherism. His determination to force a "cultural revolution" in the collective national psyche is a trifle farcical. And unprincipled to boot. He recently introduced legislation -- in tandem with his pension cuts, calling for genetic profiling of immigrants to ensure any relatives intending to immigrate are linked genetically. The strategy appears to be to soften the blow of the social security cuts by appealing to xenophobic racism.
The state of race relations in France is an even more muddled picture than the devastating caricatures by French-African comedian Dieudonne suggest. He is notorious for playing the part of a Hassidic Jew who mimics the Nazi salute. Few politicians blame their troubles on cynical comedians, though, and Sarkozy is no exception. His fans point accusing fingers at the "irresponsible press".
The real magic starts when you power Sarkozy with his ex-model wife. She, after all, played a part in the freeing of the Bulgarian nurses and a Palestinian medical doctor. She, too, is of Spanish-Jewish ancestry. But, that may be nothing but an insignificant aside. France, generally, regarded their bust-up as something of a bad joke. Unlike the Americans, the French do not take the private lives of their presidents terribly seriously. There was the late François Mitterrand, for example. Hardly anyone in all France raised an eyebrow when it transpired that he had an illegitimate daughter. The French are more concerned with the ideological orientation and political affiliation of their president and are not in the least interested in their private affairs -- at least not in any political sense.
The interesting twist, however, is that the contest between Cecilia and Nicolas Sarkozy is a comic cross between a lover's tiff and the battle of the sexes. It appears befuddled French voters are being forced to turn a blind eye to their leaders' antics. Sarkozy's divorce follows hard on the heels of the separation of France's first female presidential candidate Ségolène Royal, the "gazelle" of French politics, from her lifelong lover François Hollande barely a month after she lost the presidential race in May. Moreover, at the tender age of 19, Royal sued her father for his refusal to divorce her mother and pay alimony and child support. That was way back in 1972; barely a decade later she won the case against her father. Ironically, Royal's own mentor the late French socialist president Mitterrand was notorious for his extra-marital affairs, the most conspicuous being his love affair with Anne Pingeot and subsequent disclosure towards the end of his life that he fathered an illegitimate daughter Mazarine with her.
And, what of the voters? The latest hazard facing the French president has been his socio-economic policies. Sarkozy's showdown with the trade unions threatens to turn into a deciding moment for France. Foreign policy, too, has come under much scrutiny. France has become fanatically Atlanticist under the presidency of Sarkozy. Although, unlike US President George W Bush, Sarkozy does not make much noise about his own dubious religious convictions. The commonest criticism of Sarkozy is that he is overly conscious of his religious heritage, a trait that is not appreciated by the fanatically secular French political establishment. France is culturally the most irreligious country in Europe, itself the most secular and anti-religious of the world's continents.
For a politician acclaimed for his acumen, it is startling that Sarkozy has been tripped up by events he should have seen coming. His sagacity obviously failed him this week. Le Figaro let the cat out of the bag. And his wife, too, after shopping with Lyudmila Putin, the Russian first lady, apparently decided that she had had enough of being treated as "part of the furniture" and made their rift very public.
France is now in the awkward position of having no first lady. The 49 year- old former model, lawyer and political advisor is by no means media shy. "I gave Nicolas 20 years of my life," she told the popular French magazine Elle in a special feature which she asked for personally, despite the awkwardness of its timing. She had long complained of being politically peripheralised. Troubling as that interpretation is, it is in a way a consoling one for Sarkozy. He is now free to handle his opponents without his maverick Cecilia breathing down his neck or, on the contrary, disappearing at crucial moments.
Even with his personal life in tatters, Sarkozy is obliged to hoist the French tricoleur high in the international arena. Which flag is it to be?
Wed Nov 07, 2007 6:53 am
postcardsfrompalestine VIP
Joined: 05 Sep 2006 Posts: 1737 Location: It means good luck - a chinese symbol
Sarkosy Signs Huge Trade deal with China
Well, Somebody has to buy all their "China's" Plastic crap when the US goes down the toilet.
What do you think of Obadiah Shoher's views on the Middle East conflict? One can argue, of course, that Shoher is ultra-right, but his followers are far from being a marginal group. Also, he rejects Jewish moralistic reasoning - that's alone is highly unusual for the Israeli right. And he is very influential here in Israel. So what do you think?
uh, here's the site in question: Middle East conflict
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