“This is our third success this month, with Barcelona and Avignon.”

Paris, 31 January 2023

The Mayor of Lyon has cancelled the conference – planned for 1 February – entitled “30 Years After Signing the Oslo Accords: Overview on Palestine,” featuring exclusively pro-Palestinian invitees for a one-sided Israel-bashing hate-fest.

Among the speakers was Salah Hamouri, presented as a “Franco-Palestinian lawyer... former political prisoner.”

In an open letter to the Mayor (see press release below), the Centre’s Director for International Relations, Dr Shimon Samuels, stressed that Hamouri was, in fact, “a member of the terror group Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP). Condemned for his role in the attempted murder of Israel’s Chief Rabbi, freed with 1,026 other prisoners in exchange for an Israeli hostage... and then rearrested for ongoing activity with the PFLP.. Hamouri was finally expelled to France last month...”

Ironically, among the Palestinian groups staunchly opposed to the Oslo Accords, was the PFLP. It had even broken away from the PLO, accusing the latter of abandoning the main goal of destroying Israel. The PFLP had links to Islamic fundamentalist groups linked to Iran, such as Hamas and Hezbollah. It had been particularly active during the Second Intifada, wreaking havoc in Israel with targeted assassinations, mass shootings and suicide bombings.

The Mayor expressed concern that the recent outburst of violence in the Middle East – i.e. the terror attacks in Neve Yaacov and in Jerusalem – could be “imported into his city.”

Indeed, it would not have been the first time that the conflict was transferred to the streets of Europe. In particular, the PFLP has been among the groups on the European terror list since the late 1960’s... Palestinian terrorists had bloodied synagogues, airports, airlines, buses, cruise ships, embassies and restaurants for over three decades.

Then, came the 2nd Intifada: European-born extremists attacked Jews and Jewish institutions. In France alone, the Toulouse school massacre, the torture to death of Ilan Halimi, the targeted murders of Sarah Halimi and Holocaust survivor Mireille Knoll in their homes, the Paris Kosher supermarket hostage killings... were all carried out “in solidarity with the Palestinian cause.”

“This conference in Lyon – that was to be held in the hall dedicated to Justin Godart, former Mayor of Lyon and a Righteous Among the Nations – would have been an exercise in incitement to Jew-hatred. Such banalization of evil would have opened the floodgates to violence. Those who last week wept for the Jews killed by the Nazis, must show respect also for the survivors,” concluded Samuels.

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For further information, contact Shimon Samuels at csweurope@gmail.com