The French parliament backed a bill that would promote Alfred Dreyfus, a Jewish French army captain wrongly convicted of treason in 1894, to the rank of brigadier general, an act of reparation for one of the most notorious acts of antisemitism in the country’s history.
The lower-house National Assembly unanimously approved the legislation, which is seen as a symbolic step in the fight against antisemitism in modern France.
The draft law was put forward by former prime minister Gabriel Attal, who leads President Emmanuel Macron’s centrist Renaissance party.
For the promotion to take effect, it still has to be approved by the upper house Senate at a date that has yet to be fixed.
All 197 deputies present voted in favour in the lower house.
The rapporteur of the proposed law, Renaissance lawmaker Charles Sitzenstuhl, said the vote “will go down in history” and called on senators “to quickly adopt the text”.
The symbolic promotion of Dreyfus, whose condemnation came amid rampant antisemitism in the French army and wider society in the late 19th century, comes at a time of growing alarm over hate crimes targeting Jews in the country.
“Promoting Alfred Dreyfus to the rank of brigadier general would constitute an act of reparation, a recognition of his merits, and a tribute to his commitment to the Republic,” said Attal, who was France’s youngest prime minister during a spell in office that lasted less than eight months last year.
“The antisemitism that hit Alfred Dreyfus is not a thing of the past,” said Attal, whose father was Jewish, adding that France must reaffirm its “absolute commitment against all forms of discrimination”.
Sitzenstuhl had also suggested while the bill was being debated at parliament’s defence committee – where it won overwhelming approval – that Dreyfus could be entombed in the Pantheon, the Paris mausoleum reserved for France’s greatest heroes.
