Israeli official says meet with French far-right leader inadvertent
Health Ministry's deputy head cut short talks with Nicolas Bay after learning of his prominent role in the National Front
A senior Health Ministry official unwittingly met with the secretary general of France’s far-right political party last week, but halted the meeting as soon as his identity became clear, the ministry said.
Arnon Afek, the ministry’s deputy director, attended the meeting, which was billed as focused on medical cooperation, and did not know Nicolas Bay represented the National Front, ministry spokesman Eyal Basson said on Saturday.
Basson said the meeting was halted within five minutes.
Israel has no official ties to the party because of its far-right ideology and history of anti-Semitism. Party leader Marine Le Pen is a leading presidential candidate in the upcoming election.
Bay tweeted photos of his meetings with various Israeli officials, including Afek, an Israeli medical commander, a leading member of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party, the leader of the party’s youth organization, and other civil society leaders. Those with an army colonel and Afek were later deleted.
Last week, the Haaretz daily reported that Bay was visiting to meet French citizens living in Israel and shore up French Jewish support, and to meet Israeli politicians.
His meetings come as members of other far-right parties in Europe have paid visits to Israel and sought to forge ties with the Jewish state, though some in Israel and abroad have expressed misgivings over making common cause with the groups.
“The meeting with Mr. Bay was unofficial and took place by coincidence,” said David Shayan, head of the Likud party’s youth group. “Likud Youth has no interest in involvement with the political process and elections in France.” He declined to say what was discussed in the meeting.
Since Le Pen took over the leadership in 2011, she has worked to scrub away the anti-Semitic image inherited from the long reign of her father, Jean-Marie Le Pen, a party co-founder convicted of racism and anti-Semitism.
She had her father expelled as a party member, though a court ruled he remain honorary president for life.
Johann Habib, spokesman of the Israeli Francophone Federation, called the visit “shocking” and “a provocation.”
“This party does not share our values of democracy and equality and tolerance,” Habib said. “The party is anti-Semitic.” He questioned why Israel allowed him into the country.
Last month, in a letter sent to Vienna’s Jewish Community and given to The Times of Israel by the Israeli president’s office, Reuven Rivlin said he will “never condone” meetings between representatives of Israel and “European parties of the far right that are tainted with a history of anti-Semitism, Holocaust denial… or the promotion of racial hatred or intolerance.”
The president said he was “against any meetings by official representatives of Israel with representatives of such groups.”
Earlier in December, Israel’s Foreign Ministry put out a directive advising ministers against meeting a member of a Swedish far-right party visiting the country as part of a delegation of European and US lawmakers.
Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked and Deputy Foreign Minister Tzipi Hotovely canceled meetings with the Jerusalem Leaders Summit, a gathering of conservative parliamentarians, due to the participation of Kristina Winberg, a member of the European Parliament for the Sweden Democrats.
A spokesperson for the Foreign Ministry said the decision to exclude Winberg was made due to her party’s far-right and ultra-nationalist positions.
In protest over Israel’s decision to exclude Winberg from the briefing with Hotovely, the entire delegation, which notably included a senior member of the transition team for Donald Trump, who was still president-elect at the time, decided to boycott the meeting.
Last week, US State Department official Holly Hufnagle, who monitors anti-Semitism in the US and Europe, told a gathering of Jewish leaders in Brussels that European far-right parties, which typically campaign on ethno-nationalist, anti-migrant and anti-Muslim platforms, were attempting to whitewash their anti-Semitism with purported newfound support for Israel.
“We fear that these extreme right-wing parties are using their anti-Muslim platforms to gain Jewish support,” she said, “and for a number of Jewish communities in Europe, this is a pressing question.”