A new survey by the Institut français d’opinion publique (IFOP), has uncovered alarming levels of antisemitism in French schools, with Jewish students facing significant rejection from peers particularly by those from Muslim backgrounds.

Among Muslim secondary school students, 37% stated they would refuse to date a Jewish classmate, while 45% rejected even forming friendships with Jewish peers. When Jewish students expressed support for Israel, the rejection rate soared to 72%.

Meanwhile, students with both parents born outside Europe were four times more likely to reject Jewish classmates compared to students with French-born parents. The trend appears particularly pronounced in Priority Education Network (REP) schools located in neighborhoods with high immigrant populations.

Despite the survey’s troubling implications for Jewish students in the French education system, mainstream media outlets have largely sidestepped extensive coverage of the findings, while political leaders have remained notably silent on the matter.

Housing a large portion of Europe’s Arab population, France has faced escalating antisemitism since Hamas attacked Israel on October 7, 2023. In September, a synagogue in La Grande-Motte was targeted with arson, and an elderly Jewish woman in a Paris suburb was attacked. Notoriously, a 12-year-old Jewish girl was raped by three Arab boys in Paris over the summer. At the time, the child told investigators that she was called a “dirty Jew” and other antisemitic slurs during her abuse.

Other infamous incidents over the past year include when an assailant broke into a Paris daycare and threatened its Jewish director with a knife, and an attempted murder of a Jewish woman in her home in Lyon. Shortly after Oct. 7, police thwarted a plot that planned to blow up 20 Jewish schools in Paris.