After the capitualtion of the French to the Occupying Germans, in June 1940, Rene continued to live and work in Paris. By the autumn of 1941 things were getting dangerous for Parisian Jews and Rene decided it was time to get out.
His motives may not have been simply that he feared he would be arrested and sent to a Labour camp. As a naturalised French citizen from an early age (probably 1930) he might have been left alone by the Germans – at least at this point. But it is likely he was already planning, if not actively involved in insurrection. Certainly when he reached Marseilles he was in contact with others who were not going to just roll over.
But being Jewish did certainly make things more dangerous for him wherever he was living. He went to live at the house of his Mother-In-Law, M. Rouvier in Marseilles and began working for Maison SEGARD & CIE, raw wool merchant, as a Commercial Secretary.