French Jewish Lawmaker Stirs Controversy With Hebrew Prayers — And Focus On Israel
Image by twitter
Meyer Habib, who represents in the French Parliament nationals living abroad in eight countries including Israel, stirred a controversy this week after he gave a victory speech in which he thanked God and prayed in Hebrew.
“I can’t stop myself from thanking you and also thanking the All Powerful, because while we are in a secular republic, I am a believer,” Habib, who lives in Israel and is a confidant of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, said in a video.
Habib’s campaign – including the victory speech – departed from norms in France, where officials usually refrain from public affirmations of faith.
“He doesn’t respect voters in the whole of the constituency, promising to do nothing for them, and only focusing on Israel,” said Drory, a member of French President Emmanuel Macron’s En Marche party.
Habib, who ran on the ballot of the center-right Union of Democrats and Independents, blasted Drory as a “pro-Palestinian candidate” and a backer of “anti-religious state secularism.” The election occurred on Sunday, when French voters cast ballots in the second round of the country’s legislative elections.
Contact Daniel J. Solomon at [email protected] or on Twitter @DanielJSolomon
A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you move on, I wanted to ask you to support the Forward’s award-winning journalism during our High Holiday Monthly Donor Drive.
If you’ve turned to the Forward in the past 12 months to better understand the world around you, we hope you will support us with a gift now. Your support has a direct impact, giving us the resources we need to report from Israel and around the U.S., across college campuses, and wherever there is news of importance to American Jews.
Make a monthly or one-time gift and support Jewish journalism throughout 5785. The first six months of your monthly gift will be matched for twice the investment in independent Jewish journalism.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
