PARIS - No organized element appears to be behind the many anti-Semitic attacks in France recently, police said Tuesday, as 10 of 39 people questioned in the incidents remain in custody. <br>
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Alain Tourre, a police spokesman at the Interior Ministry, said many of the suspects have police records for other crimes, including vandalism, theft, violence or selling drugs. <br>
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They do not appear to be ``organized or politicized, nor are they members of anti-Zionist groups,'' he said Tuesday. Some are minors. <br>
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The attacks have coincided with an escalation in Middle East violence and have heightened tension between French Jews and the country's large Muslim community. <br>
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Synagogues, schools and cemeteries around the country have been targeted, often with firebombs. In the most serious case, a Marseille synagogue was burned to the ground on March 31. <br>
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On Monday, French President Jacques Chirac condemned the attacks but said he doesn't believe his country is anti-Semitic. <br>
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``It's an indisputable fact that there have been anti-Semitic acts, alas, and they must be prevented, punished and severely condemned,'' the president told Frequence Juive, a Jewish radio station. ``But I don't believe that the French people are becoming anti-Semitic.'' <br>
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Tens of thousands of people took to the streets in France on Sunday to protest the anti-Jewish violence. A march in Paris drew more than 50,000 people, and police fired tear gas to disperse hundreds of pro-Israel militants who fought with up to 500 counter-demonstrators.
