The law of June 2, 1941 aggravated the law of October 3, 1940 and instituted the second status of Jews, forbidding them access to universities and the exercise of many professions. Jews of French nationality did not escapeadministrative internment.
The law is also applicable in Algeria and the French overseas territories.
With this same law of June 2, 1941, published on June 14, the Vichy government clarified its new definition of a Jew, whatever his religion, whether converted or not, or his total lack of religion.
Indeed, according to the law, a Jew is “a person, whether or not he or she belongs to any denomination, who is descended from at least three grandparents of the Jewish race, or from only two if his or her spouse is himself or herself descended from two grandparents of the Jewish race”.
The entire legislative arsenal is based on the Nazi concept of the “Jewish race”.
At the same time, a second census hit the Jews. Their daily lives were difficult to bear. They were registered, spied on, threatened, denounced, stripped of their possessions and, for many, deprived of their jobs.
The pernicious strategy of persecution, known as “segmentation”, slice by slice, starting with foreign men before women, the elderly and children, maintains illusions and even encourages some French Jews to believe they are protected.
An autonomous Jewish Resistance center was set up in the southern zone by the “Solidarité ” leadership, which played a major mutual aid role from the outset. Jacques Kaminski, Sczmulek Farber and Jacques Ravine, who had crossed the demarcation line clandestinely, were its leaders. They established contacts with Jews in the main towns of the south.
In mid-June 1941, they met with non-Jewish democratic organizations. At the same time, they set about destroying any illusions of security among Jewish refugees in the southern zone.
