Marc Fredriksen, the French neo-Nazi leader, last night denied that Nazi Germany had deliberately planned to kill Jews and said that far fewer than six million had died during the war. Those who had died had simply been victims of wartime food shortages and concentration camp diseases, he said on BBC-TV “Panorama Program.”
However, Fredriksen, whose group is suspected of complicity in anti-Jewish outrages in France, also accused the Jews of being an elitist people who wanted “to dominate the world,” and said that Hitler’s attitude towards them had been “totally normal.” Fredriksen was interviewed in a hospital and showed the scars and bruises he had suffered two weeks ago when he was attacked by a group of Jewish youths.
Two Jewish activists also appeared in the program and according to the interviewer one of them had carried a revolver. Both men appeared anonymously and with their faces concealed.
One of them warned that Fredriksen had last the use of a hand after raising his hand against Jews, and warned that “next time he will lose his tongue.” The Jewish activist added: “We are not terrorists and do not want to kill anybody. But if the Nazis want to go one stage higher, we too will go one stage higher.”
FRENCH GOVERNMENT CRITICIZED
In the program, which also investigated the neo-Nazi revival in other European countries, Jean Pierre-Blach, a French Jewish member of Parliament who supports President Valery Giscard d’Estaing’s government, said that the government had taken no precautions to protect Jewish properties because it had not believed that actions like last August’s fascist bombing of Italy’s Bologna railway station could occur in Paris.
The BBC asked Jose Deltom, chairman of the French police trade union, about his allegations that 30 French policemen were named on a list of 150 dangerous anti-Semites. Deltom denied that his revelation of the list was politically motivated, saying: “My only interest is to clean up the police.”
Rabbi Michael Williams, the English-born spiritual leader of the Rue Copernic Temple which was bombed Oct. 3, said that since taking up his French post four years ago he had become aware of the depth of French anti-Semitism and the “very poisonous distinction” between Jews and Christian Frenchmen. “I am frightened to show my Jewish identity while traveling in public,” he said.
Help ensure Jewish news remains accessible to all. Your donation to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency powers the trusted journalism that has connected Jewish communities worldwide for more than 100 years. With your help, JTA can continue to deliver vital news and insights. Donate today.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
