Two Jews are members of the new French Cabinet announced here today by the new Prime Minister, Georges Pompidou, who is a director and former general manager of the Rothschild Bank.
The two Jews in the Cabinet are Michel Maurice-Bokanowsky, a holdover from the former Debre Cabinet, now holding the post of Minister of Commerce and Industry; and Gilbert Grandval, named as Secretary of State for External Affairs.
Mr. Maurice-Bokanowsky, born in France of Jewish-Polish immigrants, was Minister for Posts and Telecommunications in the Debre Government. He is credited with having achieved a highly successful reorganization of the French postal service. An early member of the Gaullist Union for the New Republic, he had previously been elected to the Chamber of Deputies from a Parisian constituency.
Mr. Grandval, a left Gaullist, formerly served as secretary-general of the French merchant navy, a non-Cabinet post. In that capacity, he was constantly in touch with many Israeli firms with which he had signed Israeli orders placed with French shipbuilders. Born of Alsatian parents, he served as an air pilot during the early phase of World War II. After France was defeated by the German armies, he headed one of the main resistance movements. Following the liberation of France, he was named High Commissioner for the Saar. Later, he was French Governor-General of Morocco, the last Frenchman holding that post.
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