The French head of state will organize a conference in 2025 on the creation of a Palestinian state. Emmanuel Macron launches the biggest diplomatic initiative of his presidency.
Emmanuel Macron, whom circumstances have pushed to withdraw from the governance of the country, intends to have more influence on the international scene in the second part of his second mandate. Like Jacques Chirac before him, in a situation of cohabitation from 1997 to 2002, the head of state can find a new political space to assert his influence, even if it means imagining a new life as a diplomat. The president has the ambition to take on certain international issues head on; he knows that France’s voice on the conflict in the Middle East is neither very well understood nor very heard.
The French president made a major announcement on December 3, which should shake up the agendas of European and American diplomats for 2025. Emmanuel Macron has decided to organize a conference with Saudi Arabia on the creation of a Palestinian state. The French head of state made this statement on the second day of his state visit to Riyadh. Accompanied by the crown prince and de facto leader of Saudi Arabia, Mohammed bin Salman, he even announced that they would chair this major diplomatic meeting together next June.
Emmanuel Macron remained vague on a very specific question: will France recognize a State of Palestine? But, we must undoubtedly see in this a desire not to offend all the interlocutors who will be invited, and to encourage Israel not to reject the initiative without it being well explained. However, the intentions to achieve the creation of a Palestinian state seem very clear. “We hope that in the coming months, together, we will multiply and unite our diplomatic initiatives to take everyone on this path,” indicated the French president, who wishes to “involve several other partners and allies, European and non-European, who are ready to go in this direction but who are waiting for France”.
The Israeli government can only be wary of the initiative of France and Saudi Arabia. But Emmanuel Macron wants to believe that international pressure will be sufficient in a few months to move the lines. The French president again expressed yesterday the “will” to recognize a Palestinian state, but “at the appropriate time, [c’est-à-dire] where it triggers reciprocal movements of recognition”. The June conference is thus presented by Emmanuel Macron as a moment “which will also make it possible to provide answers in terms of security for Israel and to convince that the two-State solution is a solution which is relevant to Israel itself.
Suffice it to say that the standoff with Benyamin Netanyahu is only just beginning: the Israeli government has a few months to discredit this conference or succeed in imposing its positions and views on it. The French president’s initiative imposes a rather unexpected balance of power for Israel, which will be required to clarify its political line on the future of the Palestinian authorities, the Palestinian territories and the West Bank settlements.