French Arab Coexistence Champion Authored Anti-Semitic Tweets
Graphic by Angelie Zaslavsky
(JTA) – A former culture minister of France distanced herself from an up-and-coming journalist who interviewed her recently following the discovery of virulent anti-Semitic tweets he authored.
Christiane Taubira, who last month granted a wide-ranging interview to Mehdi Meklat, 24, of the Les Inrocks magazine, said she would not have afforded him that access had she known that in the years 2012-14, he wrote under a pseudonym on Twitter numerous anti-Semitic, myogenic and homophobic messages.
The revelations have stunned France as Meklat, a native son born to a Muslim family from Northern Africa, had been widely regarded as a progressive proponent of religious and ethnic coexistence amid rising tensions among Muslims, Jews and others in France.
The tweets, which surfaced as Meklat was promoting his latest book, included reference to Jewish greed, Hitler and gas. Some were authored by Meklat on his Twitter account, while others appeared under the pseudonym Marcelin Deschamps.
In one tweet, published less than a month after the slaying of four Jews at a school in Toulouse by the jihadist Mohammed Merah, Meklat wrote that he was in the same building as Marine Le Pen, the leader of the far-right National Front party, adding: “I’m going to pull a Merah on her.”
In another he wrote to Le Pen: “Welcome to my cave, I will slit your throat according to the Muslim tradition.”
And in another, he wrote: “Long live the fags, long live AIDS under President Francois Hollande.”
Meklat later apologized and wrote on Facebook last month that they were part of “an experiment to test the borders of provocation.”
But in 2009 Meklat, then 16, wrote on Bondy Blog, a website devoted to discussing and resolving racial and religious tensions in France, about the need to fight anti-Semitism, which he also wrote sometimes disguised itself as anti-Zionism.
The revelations about Meklat came shortly before the first trial ever held in France of an underage defendant accused of perpetrating a jihadist attack. The boy, 15 at the time of the attack, was sentenced Thursday to seven years in jail for the January 2016 stabbing of a Jewish man in Marseille with a machete. The victim was slightly injured.
This is a moment of great uncertainty. Here’s what you can do about it.
We hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, we’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s independent Jewish news this Passover. All donations are being matched by the Forward Board - up to $100,000.
This is a moment of great uncertainty for the news media, for the Jewish people, and for our sacred democracy. It is a time of confusion and declining trust in public institutions. An era in which we need humans to report facts, conduct investigations that hold power to account, tell stories that matter and share honest discourse on all that divides us.
With no paywall or subscriptions, the Forward is entirely supported by readers like you. Every dollar you give this Passover is invested in the future of the Forward — and telling the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
The Forward doesn’t rely on funding from institutions like governments or your local Jewish federation. There are thousands of readers like you who give us $18 or $36 or $100 each month or year.
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
