It was not until more than two weeks after Hamas' attacks on Israel that Emmanuel Macron decided to visit the region. A week after most of his Western counterparts, the President of the Republic made a tour of the Middle East this week, which began with a trip to Israel. After the Jewish State, the head of state made stops in the West Bank, Jordan and Egypt. While a majority of French people (55%) believe that this visit was necessary and important, part of the country doubts its real impact on the situation. According to an Odoxa-Backbone Consulting poll for Le Figaro, only a third of respondents (32%) believe that the tenant of the Elysée Palace can play a role in the conflict, and 65% persist in thinking that the voice of France carries little weight in the region. Nearly three-quarters (72%) even go so far as to say that the positions taken by the tenant of the Élysée Palace will have no impact on the war between Israel and Hamas.
To discover
- Download the Le Figaro app: the news at the heart of your day
In addition, while a fear of the importation of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict weighs on France, 71% of French believe that Emmanuel Macron's foreign policy will not limit this risk. In search of a balanced position, Emmanuel Macron first made a point of recalling, alongside Benjamin Netanyahu, his "solidarity" with Israel, to the point of suggesting that the international anti-Daesh coalition could extend to the fight against Hamas - a controversial proposal on the international scene, but supported by 60% of the French. To Mahmoud Abbas, the President of the Republic then pleaded for the revival of a "political process with the Palestinians".
Gestures aimed at Palestinians rather popular
This discourse convinced only a quarter of the French (26%), while 30% of them believe that the Élysée has generally supported Israel. Even the assertion of a "legitimate right of the Palestinians to have a territory and a state" was not enough for public opinion to see it as a defence of the rights of the Palestinians (5%). Unsurprisingly, Renaissance supporters are the most likely to praise Emmanuel Macron's weighting (57%), while 62% of voters of La France Insoumise (LFI) judge that his remarks were pro-Israel.
By declaring that "Israel's security and the stability of the region" could not be sustainable without recognition of the "legitimate right of the Palestinians to have a state", Emmanuel Macron nevertheless garnered 75% of positive opinions. A similar proportion of French people lined up behind the head of state (73%) when he called for "targeting civilians, neither in Gaza nor anywhere", in accordance with the "laws of war".