France: Anti-Semitic Attacker Saws Man's Finger Off As Attackers Yell 'Dirty Jews, You're Going To Die'

Two Jewish brothers were beaten, with one having his finger sawed off, in an alleged attack by two men in a suburb of Paris Tuesday. One of the attackers shouted "dirty Jews, you're going to die" at the victims, who were wearing kippahs at the time of the incident in the commune of Bondy, in the northeastern suburbs of France's capital.

The attackers, who were described as being of North African origin, forced the two brothers off the road in their vehicle. Once stopped, near a shisha bar, the attackers assaulted them with punches and kicks and frequently threatened to kill them, alleged a case report by the National Bureau for Vigilance Against Anti-Semitism (BNVCA). One of the perpetrators was armed with a saw, which he used to cut off the finger of one of the brothers.

The young victims, whose father is said to be a leader in the Jewish community of Bondy, made it to a hospital before reporting the incident to the police. The BNVCA said that it has put two of its counsels at the disposal of the two men.

Bondy, known as Department 93, has a large population of Muslims of Arab and African descent and has been known for high crime rates, rundown housing projects high unemployment.

But anti-Semitism has been on the rise in France generally. The French Jewish community is the biggest in Europe, but Jews have been leaving in record numbers in recent years. Around 5,000 departed the country in 2016 after 7,900 left the previous year. Two years ago, an attack at a Jewish supermarket in Paris left four shoppers dead.

One of the leading candidates to become French president in April's election, Marine Le Pen of the far-right National Front party, earlier this month called for Jews to stop wearing the kippah as part of her campaign against radical Islam.

"Honestly, the dangerous situation in which Jews in France live is such that those who walk with a kippah are in any case a minority because they are afraid," she said.

"But I mainly think the struggle against radical Islam should be a joint struggle and everyone should say, 'There, we are sacrificing something.'"