French police. Photo: EPA/GUILLAUME HORCAJUELO

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and French President Francois Hollande attended a ceremony Nov. 1 in Toulouse that honored the four Jewish victims (a rabbi and three children) of the shooting at the Otzar Hatorah school in that city last March.

In a speech at the memorial, Hollande promised to “relentlessly fight against anti- Semitism. The Jews of France must be aware that the republic will do everything it can to protect them and to give them security,” the Jerusalem Post reported.

Israel “was established after the Holocaust as a refuge for the Jewish people,” Hollande added.

“That is why every time a Jew is a target because he or she is Jewish, Israel is concerned,” he said.

Netanyahu reminded attendees that the shooter, Mohammad Merah, also killed three French soldiers “indiscriminately—Christians and Muslims alike.”

“These murderers’ barbaric hatred threatens not only Jews, but civilization as a whole,” Netanyahu said.

French Ambassador Christophe Bigot, who also attended the ceremony, emphasized the importance of a strong relationship between Israel and France. “We will face difficult moments in the upcoming months and we will have to deal with this in the spirit of friendship,” he said.