The exercise may well be agreed, but it has the merit of offering a precise overview of the political debate. Monday October 23, the discussion initiated for more than two hours in the National Assembly on the situation in the Middle East had no other ambition than to allow all the political forces present to express their points of view, two weeks later the Hamas terrorist attack against Israel on October 7.
This debate without a vote, under article 50-1 of the Constitution, was held the day before Emmanuel Macron traveled to Israel. A visit that must be “ the opportunity to present our proposals and to tirelessly plead to avoid escalation”, explained the Prime Minister, Elisabeth Borne, to the deputies.
Each camp thus unfolded its score in a hemicycle with barely a hundred deputies. The executive, through the voices of Elisabeth Borne and Catherine Colonna, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, became the voice of the Palestinian cause and the protection of civilians, after initially defending “Israel’s right to security” and the ” right “ of the Hebrew State “to defend oneself in accordance with international law”. “The populations must not pay for the crimes of terrorists”, defended Elisabeth Borne, who at the same time called for a “humanitarian truce” to allow aid to be delivered to civilians in Gaza before a “possible ceasefire”.
“Tell your friends in Hamas!” »
Insufficient in the eyes of the elected officials of La France insoumise (LFI), who refused to applaud the tenant of Matignon, unlike the rest of the Hemicycle. In an offensive tone, their president, Mathilde Panot, spoke out against the idea of a France “aligned with the United States and the Israeli government will–you–war far right. » “Why is France incapable of denouncing with the same force the war crimes committed by Hamas and those committed by Netanyahu’s government? “, she thundered.
In a virulent atmosphere, the National Rally (RN) deputy from the North and vice-president of the Assembly, Sébastien Chenu, treated Mathilde Panot of “collaborator”. Renaissance du Cher MP François Cormier-Bouligeon chanted several times “Tell your friends in Hamas!” ». By its refusal to qualify Hamas as “terrorist”, Insoumise France is the object of intense criticism even within the New Ecological and Social Popular Union (Nupes).
Faced with the vilified “rebels”, Marine Le Pen sought as much as possible to make her speech neutral, moving forward like others before her “the right to defend oneself” of Israel, without it being “unconditional” because in front “apply in compliance with international law and human rights. » In the midst of this blunt rhetoric, she worked to send signals here and there, such as her desire to ban “ Islamist ideologies on our soil”, in an analogy between the Hamas attack and the assassination of the teacher Dominique Bernard by Mohammed Mogouchkov, a radicalized young man from Russia, on October 13, in Arras. Attempting to depict his “vision of the role of France”Marine Le Pen castigated “disintegration” of French diplomacy.
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