For all the pageantry displayed in Paris in support of Charlie Hebdo’s free speech, and against the terrorists who slaughter innocents, France remains one of the least hospitable (read: most anti-Semitic) places for Jews in Europe.

While the New York Times concerns itself with a possible backlash against Muslims in France, and supporting those who refuse mandatory military service in Israel, it’s clear that Jew hatred and outright attacks have been on the rise for quite some time.

As a Jew, I would not visit France for any reason, and I totally understand why France may be empty of Jews in just a few short years.  Platitudes from French leaders like PM Manuel Valls, who said “If 100,000 French people of Spanish origin were to leave, I would never say that France is not France anymore. But if 100,000 Jews leave, France will no longer be France. The French Republic will be judged a failure,” are disingenuous.

In fact, the French Prime Minister’s office confirmed that they were against Israeli PM Binyamin Netanyahu attending Sunday’s solidarity rally.

According to Channel 2, Paris wanted to avoid any mention of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict at the rally which was organized in a show of solidarity and defiance after a series of terrorist attacks in the French capital claimed 17 lives, including those of four Jewish men at a kosher supermarket.

When it became clear to French President Francois Hollande that the Israeli prime minister intended to join the march, he phoned to invite Netanyahu personally, according to the report.

A Jewish presence in Paris is not well tolerated by the immigrant Muslims, despite the fact that Jews have lived in Paris for centuries, surviving even the Vichy purges of WWII.

On Friday, Jewish shops closing for the Sabbath were ordered to close a bit early due to security concerns.  And for the first time since WWII, the Grand Synagogue of Paris was shuttered for Friday night Sabbath services.

Jews are fleeing terror-hit Paris because of growing anti-Semitism in France, one of Britain’s most influential Jewish journalists said today.

Stephen Pollard, editor of the Jewish Chronicle, spoke out after an Islamic terrorist took six people hostage and held them captive in a Kosher supermarket in the French capital.

This afternoon police ordered all shops in a famous Jewish neighborhood in central Paris to close.

The mayor’s office in Paris announced the closure of shops along the Rosiers street in Paris’ Marais neighborhood, in the heart of the tourist district and less than a mile away from the offices of satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo where 12 people were killed on Wednesday.

Hours before the Jewish Sabbath, the street is usually crowded with French Jews and tourists alike.

Thousands of Jews are fleeing to Israel, England (where things are not much better) and the United States, because of incidents like this reported by PBS Newshour:

If you have a David star over here, you can have a problem, or if you wear a kippa, some people come to you and say you are bad Jews, ‘we are going to kill you and put you in the sea.’ It’s frightening.

Either, as PM Valls claims, the French Republic has failed, or the French are lying about their real feelings toward Jews.  I’m not betting on their truthfulness.