- guardian.co.uk, Thursday October 12 2000 02.12 BST
In Egypt, a formal investigation was opened into violent clashes on Tuesday between police and students in Cairo, which left one police officer and nine soldiers wounded.
A number of smaller Muslim protests in Britain have resulted in the arrest for public order offences of 12 members of the militant Al-Muhajiroun group in London, Birmingham and Manchester, police said.
And police are investigating the daubing of racist graffiti at the Fieldgate Street synagogue in Whitechapel, east London.
In France, a synagogue in Trappes, west of Paris, was burned to the ground and another, also in the western suburbs, was firebombed early yesterday.
The incidents follow attacks on two Paris synagogues at the weekend, and the throwing of stones at Jewish worshippers in Lyon.
"The president condemns these acts of intolerance," Mr Chirac's spokeswoman said.
Jewish schools and community centres in France have had windows smashed and walls daubed with anti-Jewish slogans, and some 20 assaults on Jews have been reported.
"We do not condone this violence," said Yamine Makri, a Muslim organiser in Lyon. "People must remember that the Jews and Israel are not one and the same thing. But when you see small children up against the world's fourth biggest army, you cannot but protest."
The escalating violence is not one-sided. France's large Muslim community has complained of retaliatory attacks by Jewish groups.
"I have rarely seen such hatred. Everyone's nerves are exposed," said Mouloud Aounit, president of the anti-racist group MRAP, whose office windows were smashed after Jewish radio stations mistakenly identified him as one of the main organisers of anti-Israeli rallies in France.
