Protests and ‘genocides’. Our idea of France is fading, Bernard-Henri Lévy tells us

Paris. With less than six months to go before the presidential election, France is experiencing a period of severe political instability, social fragmentation and tensions on the streets. On Thursday, yet another day of nationwide mobilisation took place, organised by the trade unions to protest against low wages and the high cost of living. Today, the ‘yellow vests’ and school pupils will take to the streets again for what is known as ‘Act IV’. According to the French philosopher Bernard-Henri Lévy, “the Fifth Republic is undergoing a crisis of governance; that much is clear”. “Its majorities are crumbling. Its institutions are struggling to gain consensus. And the streets are becoming the place where people express what the political parties can no longer hear or articulate. But ultimately, it is our very idea of France that is fading. It is the very notion of what we might have in common that is vanishing,” BHL tells Il Foglio. “Added to this are these riots – aimless, hopeless, nihilistic,” continues the philosopher. “And there is no longer a genuine national narrative capable of giving meaning to French citizenship. The real question is whether all this is specific to France. Is it not perhaps a symptom of a European malaise? Or even a Western one?”

On Thursday, the Paris march also included Capjpo-EuroPalestine, a pro-Palestinian association linked to Jean-Luc Mélenchon’s radical left, which is stepping up its calls for a boycott of Israel and its campaigns under the slogan ‘Stop Genocide’. For BHL, the use of the term ‘genocide’ in relation to Gaza is ‘grotesque and potentially criminal given the consequences it may have’. “Life has led me to witness genocides. I have spoken about them in my reports. And those I have not spoken about, I have studied. I therefore understand the weight of this word, its history, what it signifies, and what it entails. And it is precisely for this reason that I cannot bear the fact that it is used as a slur and as a synonym for any atrocious war. Genocide is a precise legal term. It presupposes acts listed in the 1948 Convention, but above all a specific intention: that of destroying, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group as such. And in the case of the IDF, that intention does not exist. How can an army that gives warning before acting be defined as ‘genocidal’?”, BHL tells Il Foglio.

And again: “How can one speak of genocide when humanitarian corridors are opened to allow civilians to be evacuated and brought to safety? Where is the genocidal intent when polio vaccination campaigns are being rolled out across the whole of Gaza? Where is the will to annihilate when children from Gaza suffering from rare diseases are being transported to hospitals in neighbouring countries? Israel is doing all of this.” The political use of the term ‘genocide’ is “potentially criminal” because “it means placing a target on the head of every Israeli citizen and anyone who defends the Jewish state. It fuels contemporary anti-Semitism,” concludes BHL.