Paris - Less than a week before the visit of French President Nicolas Sarkozy to Algeria, an Algerian minister said that Sarkozy owed his electoral victory to Israel and "the Jewish lobby," the French daily Le Figaro reported Wednesday. The comments by Minister for War Veterans Mohammed Cherif Abbes were made in an interview published earlier this week in the popular Algerian daily El Khabar.
"You know the origins of the French president and those who brought him to power," Cherif Abbes said, referring to the fact that Sarkozy's mother is of Greek Sephardic Jewish descent.
"Did you know that Israeli authorities circulated a stamp bearing Sarkozy's likeness during the presidential election campaign?" he asked rhetorically.
"Why did (Foreign Minister) Bernard Kouchner, a leftist, decide to change course (and enter the government)? ... It is the result of the movement that reflects the thinking of the real architects of Sarkozy's arrival in power, the Jewish lobby which has a monopoly on French industry."
According to Le Figaro, the comments provoked little reaction in Algeria.
