By Recognizing a Palestinian State, the French President Unleashes Cascading Conflict
Michael Rubin | MEF | July 25, 2025
Photo by Amos Ben Gershom / Government Press Office of Israel, CC BY-SA 3.0, Wikipedia
On July 24, 2025, French President Emmanuel Macron, facing growing political opposition at home and with his wife signaling looming divorce, decided to change the conversation to the Middle East. Taking to social media, he tweeted the surprise announcement that he would recognize Palestinian independence when he visits New York in September for the United Nations General Assembly. “Consistent with its historic commitment to a just and lasting peace in the Middle East, I have decided that France will recognize the State of Palestine,” he wrote.
Macron may believe unilateral recognition of Palestinian independence will break the peace process logjam and advance peace in the Middle East, but he is wrong. By recognizing a Palestinian state, he unleashes cascading conflict.
First, he recognizes a state with disputed borders. To call the West Bank “occupied” raises the question, occupied from whom? Prior to the exertion of Israel’s control in 1967, Jordan both administered the West Bank and the Old City of Jerusalem, and ethnically cleansed Jews from its territories. Prior to Jordan’s creation by the British, the Ottomans administered the region, but did not utilize the same administrative districts. Palestinian Arab identity did not coalesce until the mid-twentieth century. Prior to the backdrop of Israel’s creation, those who identify as Palestinian Arab today largely saw themselves as Syrian. Most were relatively recent migrants attracted to land opened by Jewish immigrants’ draining of malarial swamps and irrigation schemes. France’s recognition will not resolve border disputes, but could add urgency to them. To recognize the 1949 Armistice Lines as the border between Israel and a Palestinian state is to declare that Israel must evacuate the Old City of Jerusalem. In effect, Macron would be resurrecting and endorsing Jordan’s ethnic cleansing of Jerusalem’s Jews in the 1940s. If, however, Macron makes exceptions for Jewish neighborhoods and towns, then he is acknowledging the prematurity of his recognition.
popped up on my FB newsfeed from “Virtually Jewish”
Block the turd from flying in to the US. His country has already been over run by Ottoman 2.0 storm troops. France is falling.
What a hot mess this Macron guy is. And understandable that he is a good buddy with Justin Trudeau – both girlymen with weird sexual predilections!