Tension, which was already high, increased a little on Tuesday, October 15 between Benjamin Netanyahu and Emmanuel Macron. After having awakened, two days before the commemorations of October 7, the fury of the Israeli Prime Minister by asking France Inter to “let’s stop handing over weapons [à Israël] to lead the fighting in Gaza,” The French head of state crossed swords with the Israeli prime minister over the UN and the creation of Israel.
“Mr Netanyahu must not forget that his country was created by a decision of the UN”Macron would have launched during the Council of Ministers, according to comments from the participants, while the war in Gaza and the fighting in Lebanon were discussed. A reference to Resolution 181 adopted in November 1947 by the United Nations General Assembly, which provided for the partition of Palestine into one. jewish state and an Arab state. “And therefore, now is not the time to free ourselves from UN decisions”, The French president would have stressed, in reference to the shooting against the UN mission (UNIFIL) deployed in southern Lebanon, that Israel demands that it be deployed a little further north in order to carry out its offensive against Hezbollah.
CRIF support
Benjamin Netanyahu’s response was scathing. “It was not the UN resolution that established the State of Israel, but rather the victory achieved in the War of Independence with the blood of heroic combatants, many of whom were survivors of the Holocaust, particularly the Vichy regime in France”the head of the Israeli government responded in a press release.
The latter received the support of the president of the Representative Council of the Jewish Institutions of France (CRIF): “The statements attributed to the President of the Republic, if confirmed, are a historical and political error”wrote Yonathan Arfi, in a message on X: “To suggest that the creation of the State of Israel was the result of a political decision by the UN is to ignore the centuries-old history of Zionism. »
Even before the controversy broke out, Emmanuel Macron and Benjamin Netanyahu spoke on the phone for more than an hour, only to once again note their differences. The French president insisted, according to the Elysée, on the “It is absolutely necessary to conclude a ceasefire without further delay in Lebanon”. The head of state has “expressed outrage after Israeli forces injured several peacekeepers in Naqoura, and urged Israel to end these unjustifiable attacks.” On the contrary, the Israeli prime minister opposes any ceasefire “unilateral” in Lebanon.
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