Spring is in the Air?

Like all love stories, that between Israel and France has had its ups and downs. Perhaps the nadir was when , after the 1967 Six-Day War, Le Grand General , echoing God, called the Jews a stiff-necked people ("le peuple juif, sûr de lui meme et dominateur" ) - or perhaps De Gaulle thought that God was only echoing him.

Prior to that, France, as Israel's main arms supplier and early provider of its nuclear facilities, could claim to be Israel's greatest friend. After the De Gaulle reversal the tilt towards the Arab nations caused something of a refroidissement in relations between the two countries, which continued somewhat unabated until the end of the Chirac presidency.

Comes Sarkozy, and Spring seems to be in the air as far as this particular romance is concerned. Significantly, the first Head of State to be invited on a presidential visit to the Elysée is Israel's Shimon Peres. French TV currently abounds with such Jewish luvvies as singers Patrick Bruel and Enrico Macias supping with the presidents. Peres himself was categorical “No country has aided Israel as much as France.” And this year's Paris International Book Fair has Israel as its Guest of Honour, greeting the inevitable Arab boycott of the event with a Gallic shrug.

Like all relationships, there is always the danger of spurned lovers lurking in the background. The amount of hate-mail directed at France emanating from certain American Jewish sources continues to be disturbing. And like all irrationalities, this cannot be quelled by facts.

Let us hope that this particular affair is more than a springtime romance, and heralds a new era of entente cordiale between two mature and consenting adult democracies.