This article originally appeared in Israel Hayom on December 2, 2025.
These days, Lebanon celebrates its Independence Day amid fears of renewed war. All the blessings and prayers of the new Pope Leo XIV in Beirut have failed to dispel the dark clouds of gloom and despair. The Lebanese crisis remains politically deadlocked because Hezbollah refuses to surrender its weapons and dismantle its military arsenal. It justifies its refusal by claiming it wants to protect the Lebanese people from “Israeli aggression.” Encouraged by Iran to continue “the armed struggle against the Zionists,” Hezbollah is thus violating the ceasefire agreed upon on November 27, 2024, under the auspices of the United States and France. The Shiite militia is strengthening its troops, training new fighters, acquiring new weapons and missiles via Syria, and preparing for a new confrontation with Israel. An unacceptable situation for the IDF and untenable for the inhabitants of Israeli villages located along the border who are trying to rebuild their homes and farms and peacefully cultivate their fields.
Given the Lebanese army’s inability to dismantle Hezbollah’s weaponry and the UN observers’ reluctance to enforce the ceasefire, the IDF has no choice but to launch raids against every violation by the Shiite militia, just as it does daily against Hamas in Gaza. The policy of restraint is now a thing of the past.
However, the recent elimination of Hezbollah’s chief of staff, Haitham Ali Tabataba’i, in the southern suburbs of Beirut, is reviving tensions. Beyond the obsession with creating a Palestinian state at any cost, the situation in Lebanon remains a real concern for French diplomacy.
Since the Crusades, the kings of France have played the role of protector of Christian populations, and in the 14th century France intervened militarily to defend the Christians Maronite’s of Mount Lebanon, who were then in conflict with the Druze. Then, from the 1920s onward, Lebanon became a French protectorate, along with Syria, as part of Greater Lebanon, until its independence in 1941.
Since the Six-Day War of 1967, France has acted unilaterally, attempting to impose its diplomacy without success. It failed to learn the lessons of the 1916 Sykes-Picot Agreement, signing the partition of the Middle East with haste and recklessness. Forty years later, it also ignored the consequences of the 1956 Suez Crisis, which resulted in the severing of diplomatic relations with all Arab countries except Lebanon. And even today, despite successive humiliations and setbacks, Macron’s France continues its unsuccessful search for influence in our region and beyond.
During the Lebanese Civil War, which began in 1975, France prioritized the exodus of Christians from the Middle East rather than protecting them on the ground. Only Israel came to their aid, as it continues to do to safeguard all minorities in the region, including the Druze.
Since taking office at the Elysée Palace on May 14, 2017, Emmanuel Macron has turned a deaf ear to warnings from the Jewish state regarding the dangerous actions of Iran and Hezbollah on the stability of the region and peace in the world.
On September 27, 2018, Prime Minister Netanyahu revealed to the United Nations General Assembly the existence of secret precision missile manufacturing sites in Lebanon. One of the sites was located beneath a football field used by a Hezbollah-sponsored team. Another was situated north of the international airport, and the third was buried beneath the port of Beirut, less than 500 meters from the airport tarmac. These three sites were not the only ones used by Hezbollah to manufacture and store precision missiles. On December 4, 2018, the IDF revealed that Hezbollah was digging attack tunnels to invade the entire Galilee region, specifying that a large-scale IDF operation, “Northern Shield,” was underway. As usual, all these revelations were denied by Hezbollah, and France turned a blind eye.
At the time, London and The Hague had decided to add Hezbollah’s “armed wing” to their list of terrorist organizations. Merkel’s Germany had the courage to declare every member of Hezbollah persona non grata.
Fearing Hezbollah’s revenge, France still makes a clear distinction between “the political” and the “military wing” as it did with Hamas before October 7, 2023. Paris does not think it is possible to disarm Hezbollah because the Shiites are part of a multi-confessional government.
President Macron had the opportunity during his visits to Beirut to tell the Lebanese leaders the whole truth. To call a spade a spade and state clearly that Hezbollah is not a political party but a dangerous militia. On February 24, 2000, didn’t Lionel Jospin, prime minister during the French cohabitation government, describe Hezbollah’s attacks against Israel and Jews as “terrorist”? Why was he reprimanded by President Chirac and the media?
While France is certainly striving to prevent another civil war in Lebanon, this concern actually extends beyond the future of the country itself. It also reflects the fact that a civil war would trigger a massive influx of hundreds of thousands of immigrants into France. Currently, over 210,000 Lebanese live in France.
With each incident on the Israeli-Lebanese border, Macron’s fears intensify, and he anxiously calls for maximum restraint from Netanyahu. These days, faced with the fear that the United States and Israel will launch new raids against the reconstruction of nuclear sites, Iran is counting on France to sign a new agreement. During his recent visit to Paris, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi proudly declared on France 24: “Iran has emerged victorious from the war with Israel and the American bombings” (sic).
Emmanuel Macron’s wide-ranging diplomatic efforts are transparent at a time when heavily indebted France is going through a deep socio-economic crisis, insecurity dominates minds in the face of Islamist terrorism, drug trafficking, and the Russian threat which is prompting the French president to set up a voluntary military service.
Despite warnings from Israel and the United States, Macron blindly continues his ostrich-like policy. Isn’t he now unpopular in his own country, isolated in Europe, and ridiculed by Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin?
Does Macron have such a short memory that he can forget the presence of Yasser Arafat and his terrorists in Beirut? Khomeini’s hateful propaganda in Neauphle-le-Château, near Paris? Has he forgiven the French base bombing in Beirut on October 23, 1983, in which 58 French paratroopers were killed? The Hezbollah attacks in Paris in the 1990s? The assassination of Shapour Bakhtiar in Paris, first Iranian Prime minister after the Islamist revolution? The attacks by the infamous terrorist Anis Naccache, or the assassination of Lebanese Prime Minister Hariri, a friend of Jacques Chirac, by Iranian Hezbollah? And so many other incidents, acts of blackmail, and humiliations, not to mention the spectacular and deadly attacks against America and Israel.
Why does he downplay the true intentions of Iran and Hezbollah and ignore the revelations of Mossad, particularly regarding the presence of Islamist terrorist networks in Europe and on his own territory?
How can he accept the presence of a mini-terrorist state in Lebanon, a country dear to France? How can he accept this fait accompli? This perfectly normal occurrence in diplomatic relations and international law? Even worse, why did he go to such lengths to elect Sleiman Frangié, the Hezbollah candidate and close associate of the Assad family, as President of the Lebanese Republic?
It seems that President Macron has no fear in condemning and boycotting the State of Israel regarding the future of the Territories, nor any qualms about supporting all Arab claims and recognizing a virtual Palestinian state.
Finally, we can smile when the former French Foreign Minister, Jean-Yves Le Drian, declared on November 27, 2025, on the BFMTV-RMC channel: “When we take stock, Emmanuel Macron’s commitment to peace at the international level will be recognized.” Really? Is he a candidate for the Nobel Prize against Donald Trump?
