Jewish leaders in France insisted the community was not under threat as rioting continued to rage in cities across the country.

Schools and cars were set alight and police shot at as the riots, which began in the suburbs and has spread to the deprived areas in other cities.

It was reported that Shuls in Pierrefitte-sur-Seine and Garages had been firebombed and rioters prevented from attacking a Shul in Stains. But community security officials said the number of anti-Semitic reports had not risen.

Manek Weintraub of France’s main Jewish community organisation, CRIF, said: “So far nothing has happened. There was a Molotov cocktail that seems to have been hurled at a small Shul but nobody really knows about it.”

According to people who live in the suburbs, this concerns French society as a whole and not Jews. The agenda of the rioters is to burn as many cars and schools as they can and resist the new measures such as the curfew.

“It will concern the public authorities but Jews are largely absent from the story, which is welcome.”

(Source: Totally Jewish)