They sometimes arrive alone, often as a couple or as a family. The men wear the kippah, the women exchange joys “shana tova” (good year!). In the room reserved for men, on the ground floor, there is no longer a free bench. Upstairs, the women’s space fills up more slowly. A little boy asks for cakes, urgent “shhhs” remind the faithful to silence, the prayer continues. On this Thursday, September 21, the first day of Rosh Hashanah, the feast celebrating the Jewish New Year, they are several hundred to hurry to the synagogue of Raincy, in the heart of Seine-Saint-Denis.
An exception in a department where the Jewish communities tend to decrease, even to disappear completely. For fear of anti-Semitism, for social advancement or for family reasons, many inhabitants of Bondy, Clichy-sous-Bois, Stains or Blanc-Mesnil have chosen to leave, often for the arrondissements and communes of the West of Paris.
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In Raincy, the movement is the opposite. The Jewish population continues to increase. With Gagny and Villemomble, neighboring towns forming the same community, it has, according to estimates, 1300 to 1600 families. The explanation is not just religious. In an environment marked by unemployment and poverty, the city is an island of calm and prosperity. Here, the median annual income (26,700 euros) is the highest in the department, much higher than that of Bondy (15,970 euros) or Clichy-sous-Bois (12,867 euros).
Le Raincy, an island of calm and prosperity
Here, there are few buildings and HLMs extremely rare. Here, the millstone pavilions and the bourgeois houses stretch along very chic “alleys”, relics of the forest past of the place. The municipal police and its ten agents, the CCTV cameras help to reassure.
Until 2014, Daniel Zerbib, current president of the Jewish community of Raincy, lived in Chelles, barely 7 kilometers away. Three years ago he moved. “In Chelles, there was no office every day, for lack of reaching the quorum of ten people. And, in certain districts, you cannot go out with a kippah. At Raincy, we are part of the decor. “, he sums up.
Despite the tranquility of the neighborhood, the synagogue on Chatrian Alley is carefully protected.
J. DANIEL / MYOP FOR THE EXPRESS
The locality appears as a world apart, protected. A few years ago, Laura left Paris to return to her husband’s hometown: “In our minds, we were moving to Raincy-Villemomble. Not in Seine-Saint-Denis,” she explains. . Petit, Samuel *, a 28-year-old restaurateur, played tennis in nearby Montfermeil. Unthinkable now. “I will not live elsewhere in the 93. No, never! In the nineteenth arrondissement of Paris either, there are too many anti-Semitic attacks,” he adds.
Le Raincy and its surroundings also have the immense advantage of having denominational schools, one of which has an excellent success rate in the baccalaureate. In July, Steve, a 39-year-old general practitioner, chose to leave the 19th arrondissement of Paris to settle in Gagny with his wife and three daughters. School was a decisive element in his choice. However, he grew up in Sarcelles and only frequented the public. “But that was thirty years ago. Today, it’s harder to go to secular school,” he says, reluctantly.
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When they still lived in Paris, an incident affecting a friend of his daughter marked him: the child was severely pushed by the other students when she said that her grandfather was a rabbi. “That one can, in full Paris, at 8 years old, undergo such hostilities, I do not understand … When I was small, I knew fights of children, but never because of religion” , he continues. The prospect of living in a lodge and joining an active community did the rest.
Integration and discretion: nothing ostensible
In addition to the school, Le Raincy offers something to live on according to its precepts: several synagogues within walking distance to respect the rule which prohibits driving on Shabbat days, shops – supermarkets, butchers, pastry shops …- and restaurants in more and more. Nothing ostentatious, however. Under the leadership of its rabbi for twenty years, Moshe Lewin, the community has chosen integration and discretion.
Of course, mezuzas on the doors, kippas on their heads, larger beards and longer skirts for the Orthodox signal a presence. But, for a Hyper Cacher or a “Michael Products of Israel” that appear in broad daylight, it is often necessary to know how to decode the signs, like a k outside a restaurant, to guess the kosher character. of the place.
Since 2005 and the riots in Clichy-sous-Bois, the rabbi has regularly intervened in schools with the parish priest, the imam and the pastor. “It is not a question of proselytizing, but of answering the questions of these students from third to final. I really believe that they come out different,” he says.
Since the riots in Clichy-sous-Bois in 2005, Rabbi Moshe Lewin regularly intervenes in schools with the parish priest, the imam and the pastor.
J. DANIEL / MYOP FOR THE EXPRESS
All the rabbi’s efforts are not enough to reassure his followers. Samuel admits it bluntly. He, who nevertheless grew up in Raincy, is never completely serene. When he opened his last restaurant, he chose a small residential street, he did not advertise and took care to opacify the glass facades to, he says, guarantee the safety of his customers.
The aggression in Livry-Gargan awakened anxieties
Three weeks ago, he heard a rumor about plans to attack Jewish traders. True or false? He doesn’t know, but he’s taking more precautions than before. He never wears his kippah in the street and no longer uses public transport. If he had the means to go to Israel, he would have already done his alya.
Samuel is one of the few who speaks openly about his fear. However, among many Jews in Raincy, the anti-Semitic aggression suffered by a family from Livry-Gargan on the night of September 7 to 8 has awakened anxieties. Because the town is contiguous, because many know the father of the family in question, because he lives in a house that strangely resembles theirs.
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Laura has long asked her sons to remove their kippah when they leave the synagogue. From now on, she is very much on the side of closing doors and windows. No question of leaving one ajar. “I have been more rigorous since the Livry-Gargan affair,” she admits.
Everyone has their limit. Betty Salem, who chairs the Jewish Elderly Club, is careful to lock the door during weekly meetings at the synagogue. Even Herbert Friedmann, former president of the community, now in his eighties, who wants to be resolutely optimistic having learned during the Second World War that, “even in the worst situations, the worst is never certain”, pays attention. He wears his kippah in the street, but regrets that some go out with their prayer shawls. “I find it unnecessary to expose yourself,” he says.
Here, a video protection camera, there, a gate without an external handle testify to a life on the alert. In front of the synagogue, at the end of services, the faithful are asked not to linger. From two cameras that monitored the place in the 1980s, we have now grown to six. The scalloping surrounding the courtyard has been enhanced to prevent overly curious glances.
For Yom Kippur, the feast of Atonement, September 29, which even the least religious of Jews respect, the street of the synagogue will be closed to traffic. Dogs and ram anti-vehicle barriers have been ordered. In case. Even at Raincy.
Fewer departures to Israel
In Raincy, as elsewhere, the aliyah – the “rise” to the Promised Land – makes more than one dream in the Jewish community. But they are much less numerous than two years ago to actually move. The Jewish Agency in France, a public body, estimates the flow at 4,000 departures in 2017. A sharp drop compared to 2016 (5,000 departures).
On the other hand, during the two previous years, France had been in the first rank of countries of emigration to Israel, with 7,230 departures in 2014 and 7,900 in 2015, the highest level ever reached since 1948. The killing in the Jewish school Toulouse in 2012 and the attack against the Hyper Cacher in Vincennes in 2015 had undoubtedly accelerated the transfers. In ten years, around 40,000 French people have chosen to join Israel. That is almost 1 in 10 members of the Jewish community.
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* The first name has been changed.
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