Day of Wrath
The Transformations of Contemporary Antisemitism: Between Continuation and Resurgence
By Pierre BirnbaumEnglish
In late January 2014, in the context of Catholic protests against same-sex marriage, an anti-Semitic collective action occurred in the streets of Paris, quite similar to the one that happened in 1898 during the secularization of the French public realm. Militants belonging to the radical right (with references going back to the end of the nineteenth century) and some young French Muslims (adopting new symbols of the hatred against Jews), surprisingly united for once to threaten French Jews, seen once again as foreigners to the French nation. The withdrawal of the State and its growing lack of legitimacy give antagonistic “imagined communities” the opportunity to threaten the universalism of the public space.
Keywords
- Contemporary France
- anti-semitism
- nationalism
- catholicism
- immigration
- State