For first time in decades, Sephardi to lead French Jewry

France’s Jewish community, the largest in Europe, chose a Sephardi Jew as its leader Sunday for the first time in half a century.

Francis Kalifat, 63, said his priority as president of the CRIF umbrella grouping of Jewish organizations was to “fight against anti-Semitism in all its forms.”

He succeeds 79-year-old Roger Cukierman for a three-year term, breaking the dominance of Ashkenazi Jews in the organization which groups together 70 associations. The Algerian-born Kalifat was the only candidate running this election.

Kalifat takes over at a highly sensitive time for French Jews, who were targeted when a jihadist gunman linked to the attackers of the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo killed four hostages in the siege of a kosher supermarket in January 2015.

In 2015, more than 800 anti-Semitic acts and threats were recorded in France, that in part sparked record emigration by Jews from France in recent years.

Since 2012, attacks on Jewish targets by French Islamists in France and Belgium claimed the lives of 12 people. Last year, roughly 8,000 French Jews left for Israel — the highest number on record for any year, which made France for the second year straight Israel’s largest provider of newcomers.

After his unanimous election to the post, Kalifat said rampant anti-Semitism was responsible for French Jews experiencing the most difficult situation they have encountered since 1945.

“The fight against anti-Semitism is our main cause because French Jews are in the most difficult situation they have experience since World War II,” he said during an interview with Radio J Sunday.

“I think all of our force needs to be united to fight against this anti-Semitism in all its forms, because we see this new anti-Semitism advancing under the guise of anti-Zionism,” added Kalifat, a businessman and longtime activist for Zionist and Jewish causes.

Fulfilling a role similar to Britain’s Board of Deputies of British Jews, CRIF is widely considered to be the main representative political body of French Jews, hosting French presidents and prime minister at events and gala dinners several times a year. The CRIF presidential election takes place every three years.

France’s Jewish community in predominantly Sephardic, with Ashkenazi Jews estimated to constitute a minority of 30 percent of the community. Roughly half of French Jews were murdered in the Holocaust. Hundreds of thousands of Jews later immigrated to France from North Africa, replenishing the community’s ranks. Yet CRIF has had a succession of Ashkenazi presidents, in what some critics said reflected a disconnect between the organization’s constituents and its leadership.

Following his election by the CRIF executive council, Kalifat delivered a speech that he began by recalling his parents.

“My mother, a real Jewish mother, was always understanding, warm and tolerant,” he said. “My father was a police official who loyally served our country and taught me humbleness, patience and respect for others but above all — a sense of duty.”