You are now entering the Jewish Currents archive.
January 11: Prime Minister France of France
Pierre Mendes France, the leftwing prime minister of France for less than a year (1954-55), was born on this date in 1907 in Paris. He came into office following the Vietnamese defeat of the French at Dien Bien Phu and immediately negotiated an armistice with Ho Chi Minh that led to the total withdrawal of French troops — a move that fetched much anti-Semitic abuse from the nationalist and Catholic right in France. He also set in motion negotiations for the independence of Tunisia and Morocco. “After 1958,” reports the Oxford Dictionary of Political Biography, “his implacable opposition to what he saw as the authoritarian nature of [De Gaulle]s] Fifth Republic appealed not only to defenders of France’s republican traditions but to a new generation of political radicals. . . . he was the only established political figure to have the respect of the protesting students [in] 1968 . . .”
“To govern is to choose between two bad solutions.” —Pierre Mendes France
I’m Peter Beinart, editor-at-large of Jewish Currents. Before you go, I need to ask something of you.
In recent years, I’ve watched as mainstream Jewish institutions and media have chosen ethnonationalism over liberal democracy and mass slaughter over the pursuit of a just peace. Jewish Currents offers something different. It’s a magazine built on intellectual curiosity and respect for the dignity of all people.
But a project like this doesn’t sustain itself, and we can’t do it without your help. If you share my belief in the importance of this mission, please consider making a donation—or even better, a recurring one. We need you with us.
