Emmanuel Macron will host Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam on Tuesday evening, as new talks between Israel and Lebanon are expected to take place in Washington on Thursday.
The visit comes as the Élysée Palace said France intends to”reaffirm its commitment to the strict respect of the ceasefire, France’s support for Lebanon’s territorial integrity and the steps taken by the Lebanese state to fully guarantee its sovereignty and arms monopoly.”
This diplomatic sequence is unfolding in a particularly tense atmosphere following the death on Saturday of a French soldier serving with the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL).
All 15 members of the UN Security Council condemned the attack and called for those responsible”to be brought to justice without delay.”The French President and the UN blame the Iran-backed militant group, Hezbollah.
On Monday, Macron accused the group of killing Staff Sergeant Florian Montorio in an ambush targeting UN peacekeepers on Saturday, while insisting the soldier had not been targeted because he was a French citizen.
“Hezbollah did indeed target our soldiers (…) They didn’t target them because they were French. They targeted them because they were carrying out their mission_,”_ Macron said at a press conference in Poland.
Macron also said that “the Lebanese authorities have condemned this attack and will take the necessary steps to arrest those responsible and ensure that they are punished.”
The future of the UN’s security mission to southern Lebanon is also in question.
The UNIFIL mission is due to start withdrawing its peacekeepers at the end of the year.
This prospect raises a central question: who will ensure the future security in the border area between Lebanon and Israel, two countries that have been at war since 1948?
Deployed since 1978, UNIFIL’s role has been to help restore peace and support the Lebanese state authority in the south of the country.
Shortly before the meeting between Macron and Salam, an Elysée Palace adviser told journalists, including Euronews**,** that discussions were underway with European countries already involved in the UN mission, including Spain, Italy and Germany.
“These actors are now making a very direct contribution to the discussions on what an international force to support the Lebanese government might look like,” he said, adding that this did not necessarily mean that these countries would be involved in Lebanon once the UN withdrew.
But this strategic reflection comes at a time when France’s diplomatic position seems to have weakened.
Despite Paris’ interest in playing a mediating role in the new direct talks between Israel and Lebanon in Washington, Israeli officials have insisted that France is not involved in the negotiations.
The Israeli ambassador to the US, Yechiel Leiter, said last week that officials do “not want the French anywhere near these negotiations.”
“We like to keep the French as far away as possible from pretty much everything, but particularly when it comes to peace negotiations,” he continued.
Among Israel’s many grievances against France are the exclusion of a dozen Israeli defence companies from the Eurosatory 2024 exhibition in Paris and the Paris Air Show 2025, as well as France’s leading role in recognising Palestinian statehood.
France’s exclusion is all the more striking given the country’s longstanding historic ties with Lebanon, inherited from the French mandate after World War I.
Paris also helped facilitate the indirect talks that led to the 2024 ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah.
At the same time, the conflict in the Middle East is also weighing on France’s own budget.
On Tuesday, the government is due to unveil new spending cuts to offset the economic impact of the war, estimated at between €4-6 billion for France.
Announcements are expected later on Tuesday. In particular, Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu is due to speak on fuel subsidies as prices skyrocket, with the possibility of extending measures already in place.