Frédéric Lefebvre – who represents French voters expatriates in the United States and Canada in the French Parliament – told the online newspaper The Algemeiner that the response of the authorities to the murder of Sarah Halimi on April 7 demonstrates "that in France as much as in the United States, we refuse to call a spade a spade".
Halimi was beaten and tortured senselessly, then thrown out the window of her three-storey apartment by an intruder named in the press as Kada Traoré, a 27-year-old Malian immigrant. The police who arrived on the scene delayed the moment of their intervention after hearing Traoré shouting: "Allah W'Akbar", fearing that it was an Islamist terrorist attack and that they were insufficiently equipped to deal with it.
The investigation into the circumstances of Sarah Halimi's murder has enraged the Jews of France over its exclusive focus on the so-called 'mental health' of assassin Traoré, which many fear will result in a dismissal. of the crime as an "act of madness" instead of its true qualification as an anti-Semitic hate crime. The total indifference marked by the French media towards the fate suffered by Sarah Halimi led one of her defenders, the left-wing philosopher Michel Onfray, to protest the factwhat was "killed twice".
Lefebvre remains firm on how the investigation should proceed: "It's an anti-Semitic act and it's murder and that's what it should be called and no other way," he said. “The murderer must pay for his actions”.
Lefebvre explained that in France: “madness is considered a mitigating circumstance. Taking this into account, there is an undeniable risk of treating real terrorists and real anti-Semites as madmen or “unbalanced”, which would cause their crimes to go unpunished”. He added that a court jury could probably decide for a much harsher sentence.”
Lefebvre is in the best position for re-election in the first round of two cycles of parliamentary legislative elections, which were held on Sunday and will end on June 18. One of eleven French parliamentary deputies representing French expatriates abroad, Lefebvre is the favorite among the candidates of the more than 180.000 French citizens of the United States and Canada.
Last Thursday, Lefebvre made headlines in the French press, announcing his resignation from the centre-right Les Républicains party, over the party's reluctance to support Macron, the leader of the centrist La République En Marche party, who has won 70% of the vote of French North Americans in last month's presidential election against far-right candidate Marine Le Pen.
“I left the Les Républicains Party because it questions the legitimacy of the new President and wants to prevent him from governing,” Lefebvre declared. “But now is the time to change our political attitude – that's why I'm taking up the cause for the new President”.
Lefebvre explained that his appreciation of Macron's worth stems from having worked with him. “We have developed a relationship based on mutual trust,” he says. “We share the same certainty that we will only be able to reform France if we involve responsible people from left and right”.
A member of the Parliamentary Defense Committee, Lefebvre has frequently castigated French foreign policy in the Middle East for always behaving "blindly pro-Arab".
"We must first defend the birthplace of democracy which is Israel," he said.
Lefebvre urges the French government to revise its aid policy to the Palestinian Authority (PA) so that "subsidies are linked to the development of commercial and industrial affairs in the Palestinian territories, instead of these subsidies being paid indirectly to finance terrorism”.
I hope that Emmanuel Macron will pay attention to this and I am ready to help him to do so,” he said.
He also recommended the creation of a border police force covering the whole of Europe in order to guard its margins against the continual wave of terrorist attacks in major cities all around the continent. "We need 'reactive zones' all around Europe with checkpoints", added Lefebvre.
When asked what his message is to Jews in France who are thinking of immigrating because of the increased risks associated with anti-Semitism and uncertain economic prospects, Lefebvre replies: "It's your land, don't give up. France must offer you its protection”.
