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Macron proposes international coalition against Hamas
"France is ready for the international coalition against Daesh in which we are taking part for operations in Iraq and Syria to also fight against Hamas," Macron told reporters alongside Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Jerusalem.
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Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (right) greets French President Emmanuel Macron before a meeting in Jerusalem on October 24, 2023. (AFP/Christophe Ena)
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rench President Emmanuel Macron on Tuesday proposed that the existing international coalition fighting against Islamic State in Iraq and Syria could be widened to also include the fight against Hamas in Gaza.
"France is ready for the international coalition against Daesh in which we are taking part for operations in Iraq and Syria to also fight against Hamas," Macron told reporters alongside Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Jerusalem.
Macron was the first Western leader to visit both Israel's premier and the Palestinian president, more than two weeks into the brutal Gaza conflict that has claimed thousands of lives.
As Israel battles Gaza's Islamist rulers Hamas after suffering the worst attack in its 75-year history, Macron visited to express solidarity but also to stress the need to protect Gaza's civilian population in the withering bombing campaign since.
Hamas in its October 7 attack on southern Israel killed more than 1,400 people and took over 200 hostages, Israeli officials say. Retaliatory air and artillery strikes since then have killed over 5,000 in Gaza, according to the Hamas-ruled health ministry.
Israeli strikes on the besieged Gaza Strip overnight killed another 140 people, Hamas said after the militant group released two more of the Israeli and foreign hostages it abducted.
UN human rights chief Volker Turk on Monday urged an "immediate humanitarian ceasefire" for Gaza where about half of the population of 2.4 million has been driven from their homes.
Macron, the latest of a string of Western leaders to visit Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, after the US, British, German and Italian leaders went, was then also set to visit Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas in the occupied West Bank.
"The first objective we should have today is the release of all hostages, without any distinction, because this is an awful crime to play with the lives of children, adults, old people, civilians and soldiers," Macron said after meeting President Isaac Herzog.
France and Israel are "linked by grief" Macron said after earlier meeting the families of some of the French people killed or taken hostage by Hamas.
