Francois Hollande has said it is 'intolerable' that French Jews feel they have to hide their religion after anti-Semitic attacks prompted a call to abandon wearing the kippah.

The French President spoke out after a machete-wielding attacker wounded a Jewish teacher in Marseille before telling police he acted in the name of ISIS.

After the attack, Zvi Ammar, head of the Israelite Consistory of Marseille, asked Jews to go without their traditional skullcaps 'until better days.'

The French President spoke out after a machete-wielding attacker wounded a Jewish teacher in Marseille before telling police he acted in the name of ISIS

But Hollande rejected the idea, saying: 'It is intolerable that in our country citizens should feel so upset and under assault because of their religious choice that they would conclude that they have to hide.'

Ammar said his decision to ask Jews not to wear the kippah was the hardest of his life. But he said he prefers 'being criticised for making this decision than regretting one day if by misfortune something very grave occurs.'

Some Jewish leaders disagreed with Ammar's advice, with one calling it 'defeatist' and the Grand Rabbi of France, Haim Korsia, tweeting that 'we must not cede to emotion'.

After the attack, an investigation was opened by the anti-terrorism section of the prosecutor's office in the French capital.

After the attack, Zvi Ammar, head of the Israelite Consistory of Marseille, asked Jews to go without their traditional skullcaps 'until better days' (file picture)

The knife attack came four days after a man armed with a butcher's knife was fatally shot after authorities said he went after police at a station in central Paris.

German authorities say the man had lived at a shelter for asylum-seekers in the western city of Recklinghausen.

France is still reeling from a series of attacks in Paris on November 13 that killed 130 people and just marked the anniversary of attacks on the satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo and a kosher grocery store which killed 17 people.