Israel’s Ambassador to France, Meir Rosenne, lodged a formal protest today against President Francois Mitterrand’s reported comparison between the Israeli occupation in Lebanon and the World War II massacre carried out by the Nazis at Oradour-sur-Glane in France. Rosenne reportedly told Foreign Ministry Secretary General Francis Gutmann that any parallel between the two is “absolutely inadmissible.”
The Israeli government reacted promptly to Mitterrand’s statement. President Yitzhak Navon called it “a sacrilege” and Foreign Minister Yitzhak Shamir instructed Rosenne to lodge a formal protest at the Elysee Palace where the envoy was due to meet Mitterrand’s special adviser, Jacques Attali.
French sources said the meeting with Attali, which had been scheduled for some time, was cancelled apparently as a sign of French anger. The Elysee Palace Chief of Staff, Jean-Louis Bianco rapped Israel this afternoon saying “The Israeli authorities failed to check their facts before protesting.” He added: “The President, who has always shown his attachment to Israel, does not need to reaffirm it once again.”
The incident created by Mitterrand’s reported remark and by the successive Israeli and French protests has brought Franco-Israeli relations to their lowest ebb since the Socialist electoral victory last spring.
Israeli officials have been angered by what they view as Mitterrand’s attempts to save the Palestine Liberation Organization leadership in Beirut. This frustration has been compounded by French initiatives at the UN and the European Economic Com- munity to try and obtain an Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon. Mitterrand’s reference to Oradour has poured more oil on the fire, Israeli sources said here.
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