The French Government in Vichy today issued a drastic order which provides that all Jewish property and business enterprises in the French colonies, including leases and rights, are to be placed under the management of French officials.
The order would automatically introduce anti-Jewish economic restrictions in the Western Hemisphere, should it be also applied to Jewish possessions in Martinique, Guadeloupe and French Guiana which are under the administration of the Vichy Government.
The order came following drastic anti-Jewish regulations issued yesterday by the Gestapo in Paris prohibiting Jews in occupied France to visit any public establishments or to attend any gatherings whether indoor or outdoors. Signed by the chief of the Gestapo in occupied France, the new regulations specify that Jews are no longer allowed to enter any restaurants, cafes, bars, theatres, moving picture houses, music halls and any places of recreation. They are forbidden to attend concerts, to visit museums, to use public telephone booths, to enter libraries, to appear on market places, to bathe in public pools, to visit art galleries or any kind of exposition, or even to stop before a monument on the street.
The Gestapo regulations also bar Jews from participating in sporting activities, betting on horse races, using camping grounds for hikers, or attending any sporting event. Since Jews must wear a yellow Mogen David, it will be easy for the Gestapo to check upon violation of these regulations which practically prohibit the Jews from coming into contact with Frenchmen, except in private homes.
Reports received here today state that French students demonstrated in several places in Paris yesterday against the new anti-Jewish regulations. The fact that the decrees were issued by the Gestapo and not by the Nazi military authorities is interpreted here to mean that even more severe measures against Jews are to be expected in occupied France.
German reports reaching here today from Paris estimate that approximately 35,000 Jews are at present interned in camps in both parts of France. Of them, 25,000 are interned in Nazi-occupied France and 10,000 in the unoccupied zone.
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