New York Daily News - Eric Holder, Top U.S. Officials No-Shows at Paris Unity Rally
By Dan Friedman, Adam Edelman and Ginger Adams Otis
More than 40 heads of state came together in Paris to denounce a wave of terrorism that defiled the City of Light last week -- yet there was one glaring exception: The U.S. sent only a low-level official.
French President Francois Hollande, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, British Prime Minister David Cameron and dozens of other world leaders all took part in the powerful denunciation of last week's terror attacks that left 17 innocents dead.
Even Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas set aside their differences to march together on Boulevard Voltaire.
But the nation that stands as the symbolic face of the war on terror was nowhere in sight.
President Obama was apparently not in France, though his public schedule was empty the day of the massive gathering.
Neither President Obama nor Vice President Biden showed up -- and in fact, America's only representative was its relatively unknown and low-profile ambassador to France.
Obama and Biden had empty public schedules Sunday, but the White House declined to comment on why they didn't go.
The natural choice -- Secretary of State Kerry, a Francophile who speaks the language -- was in India for a longstanding engagement with the prime minister, White House officials said.
"We have offered, from the first moment, our intel, our law enforcement and all of our efforts, and I really think that, you know, this is sort of quibbling a little bit," Kerry told the network.
Attorney General Eric Holder did go to Paris -- but only for an anti-terrorism summit convened by Hollande ahead of the unity rally. Holder left Hollande and the others sometime after the group exited the Elysee Palace. Around the time other world leaders and dignitaries boarded buses to get to the front of the march, Holder was taping an interview for "Meet the Press," NBC confirmed.
The White House said the attorney general was returning to the U.S. on Sunday night, The New York Times reported.
That left ambassador Jane Hartley, who raised more than $500,000 in campaign funds for President Obama, to carry thetorch.
"If the highest-ranking official is an ambassador, I would say that's a serious mistake," said Rep. Pete King (R-L.I.), noting that America has asked other countries for troops in Afghanistan and Syria. "We are looking for cooperation from around the world ... weshould have had someone therewho is instantly recognizable (so people) see ...and say, "That's the United States of America.'"
Plenty of regular New Yorkers were outraged, too.
"It's really shameful that Obama, or even Biden, didn't go to France," said Tim Green, 43, who attended a vigil at the Lincoln Square Synagogue on the Upper West Side on Sunday night. "It was a major terrorist attack. We know what that feels like. I hope the French know the American people stand with them, even if our President didn't show it."
Obama has made several public statements of support for Hollande, and U.S. security agencies are in near-constant communication with France, a senior Obama official said.
The official also suggested that security for Obama and Biden might have been too distracting -- but that didn't seem to be the case for other world leaders, including Netanyahu, who later went to a synagogue with Hollande and gave a speech.
"Today I walked the streets of Paris with the leaders of the world to say enough terrorism, the time has come to fight terrorism," Netanyahu said.
Sunday's rally brought out the biggest crowd in Paris' history -- even bigger than Liberation Day in World War II, local police said. Hundreds of thousands held up "Je Suis Charlie" signs or carried candles and flowers. The victims' families wept as they walked along the boulevard named for the Enlightenment figure who helped define free speech.
One protester held a banner with Voltaire's most famous line: "I do not agree with what you say, but I will fight to the death to defend your right to say it."
The official head count was more than 1.3 million -- but French media estimated nearly 3 million. Nationally, nearly 4 million crammed into cities from Brittany to the Riviera. The rallies were echoed around the globe, in cities including London, Toronto, Madrid, Los Angeles and Washington, D.C. and on the streets of Brooklyn.
"It will have a chilling effect that America did not show up (at the Paris rally)," said filmmaker Leo Herrera, 33, in front of the Park Slope Food Co-op in Brooklyn on Sunday. "This goes into the heart of what free speech is, so we should have a really visible reaction. I don't think Obama sent any message, and that's the problem."
Meanwhile, the remaining staffers of Charlie Hebdo -- the satirical magazine attacked last week by brothers Said and Cherif Kouachi -- said they'll publish the next issue Wednesday.
Vice President Joe Biden also did not attend the rally.
Al Qaeda's branch in Yemen said it directed the slaughter to avenge the disrespect to the Prophet Muhammad, a frequent target of the weekly's satire.
The hunt for clues about the Kouachis -- who were killed in a police shootout Friday -- and their accomplices continued, with new developments Sunday:
Amedy Coulibaly, 32, the third terrorist, who killed a policewoman and four Jewish hostages at a kosher grocery store Friday, and shot a jogger two days earlier, made a ghostly appearance in a new video uploaded on militant websites. In it, Coulibaly pledged allegiance to the Islamic State.
Coulibaly also suggested he and the Kouachis had worked together -- even though they were suspected of ties to Al Qaeda -- a rival to the Islamic State.
His widow, Hayat Boumeddiene, 26, continues to elude authorities, who believe she holds key information about sleeper terrorist cells in France and elsewhere. She's being sought in Turkey and Syria.
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