French embassy reinstates worker accused of saying Hitler ‘didn’t finish job’

Cnaan Liphshiz

(JTA) – France’s embassy in Tunisia readmitted to work an employee who was suspended briefly over anti-Semitic messages that had appeared on his Facebook account, but which he claims were written by unidentified hackers.

Selim Dakhlaoui, a consulting agent for the embassy, was suspended for three days in August following the surfacing online of messages made over the past year under his name, including a comment reading “Hitler didn’t finish the job” in a discussion earlier this year about Israel’s alleged involvement in Islamist terrorism.

But he was “reintegrated and resumed his responsibilities within the embassy,” a French foreign ministry spokesperson on Wednesday told JTA, pending an investigation by Tunisian police of Dakhlaoui‘s complaint to them that unidentified individuals had written the comments under his name after taking control of his account without permission.

The statements were “unacceptable” and run contrary to “France’s values,” the ministry spokesperson added.

In addition to the remark about Hitler, his account featured in October 2015 a comment made under his name that read, “Soon it will be the end of Israel” followed by an icon of a missile. A week later, the same account displayed the message: “Go to hell, Israel.”

Shortly after the remarks were featured in article published in August about Dakhlaoui in the French-language blog Inglourious Basterds, he wrote on Twitter: “Watch out, my account has been hijacked” and deleted it.

CRIF, the umbrella group of French Jewish communities, did not seem to believe his claim.

“This is a hateful comment, just like the ones we see too often on social media. Except this one was authored by an employee of the embassy of France in Tunisia. We anxiously await their reaction!” CRIF wrote in a statement about the incident.

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