Far from European capitals and the ruins of the Gaza Strip, France’s leader still found cause to criticize Israel. President Emmanuel Macron opened his keynote speech at a recent Asian security forum in Singapore with a warning about “double standards” in international politics. European entreaties over the war in Ukraine and the need for global solidarity against Russia’s invasion, he said, were hurt by the West’s continued support of Israel’s campaign against Palestinian militant group Hamas. The war that followed Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, terrorist strike on southern Israel — which killed more than 1,200 people and saw hundreds abducted as hostages — has killed more than 54,000 Palestinians in Gaza, including many women and children, destroyed most of the territory and led to a rolling set of humanitarian crises. Politicians allied to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu are openly calling for the total conquest of Gaza and the ethnic cleansing of the territory, much to the discomfort of European governments that have backed Israel’s right to combat Hamas.  |  | |
The images of Gaza’s torment — its emaciated children, its bombed-out hospitals, its grieving families — had already roiled the public conversation for the past 20 months. Then came the events of recent days, as dozens of hungry Palestinians were killed by gunfire near aid distribution sites administered by a private U.S. and Israeli-backed group. Israel’s months-long blockade of humanitarian aid into Gaza has led to myriad statements of outrage from the international community — including from top U.N. officials and the world’s leading humanitarian organizations — and fueled war crimes charges against Netanyahu at the International Criminal Court. Arrest warrants were also sought for top Hamas leaders. The Israeli military has denied allegations that it fired at civilians while they were near or within the distribution site. More broadly, the Israeli foreign ministry has rejected claims that Israel is carrying out a humanitarian blockade and denounced Macron’s “crusade against the Jewish state” in a social media post on May 30. That same day, Macron spoke in Singapore about the damage the conflict is doing to European public diplomacy on other fronts. “If we abandon Gaza, if we consider there is a free pass for Israel, even if we do condemn the terrorist attacks, we kill our own credibility in the rest of the world,” he said. The French president is pushing to revitalize the long-moribund project of a “two-state solution” — the goal of separate Israeli and Palestinian states that has been effectively abandoned by President Donald Trump and Republicans and has little support among Israelis. France is planning on co-chairing a conference with Saudi Arabia later this month on the future of Gaza that aims to help restore the process toward the two-state solution. There are indications that Macron may use the moment to formally recognize a Palestinian state, a symbolic gesture already made by several other countries in a bid to put diplomatic pressure on Israel. Even if that doesn’t happen, Macron is not alone among prominent European leaders in shifting his tone on Israel. On Wednesday, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer described Israel’s recent actions in Gaza as “appalling, counterproductive and intolerable.” Much to the chagrin of critics to his left, he has resisted calls for a complete ban on arms sales to Israel, as well as formal recognition of a Palestinian state. But the British prime minister told parliament that his Labour government was considering targeted sanctions on particular members of the Israeli government. Public approval of Israel has tanked across Europe, including in Britain, with even Conservative members of parliament calling out Israel. Gaza has become “an abattoir where starving people are lured out through combat zones to be shot at,” Tory lawmaker Kit Malthouse said on Wednesday. “If the situation were reversed, we would now be mobilizing the British armed forces as part of an international protection force,” he added. The British deliberations dovetail with other moves on the continent. The European Union is reviewing its trade agreements with Israel, amid growing calls for sanctions over the war in Gaza and Israel’s tactics in the West Bank, where Israel’s right-wing government has stepped up an expansion of settlements, deemed illegal by the international community. Last month, Swedish foreign minister Maria Malmer Stenergard said her country would work to put in place “E.U. sanctions against individual Israeli ministers” who are “pushing an illegal settlement policy and actively opposing a future two-state solution.” No major European power has been firmer in its support for Israel than Germany, but the dynamic is changing there, too. Last month, Chancellor Friedrich Merz lamented the “human tragedy and political catastrophe” unfurling in Gaza, and said he no longer understood “what the goal of the Israeli army in Gaza Strip is” and that the harm inflicted against Gaza’s civilian population “can no longer be justified as a fight against terrorism.” On Thursday in Berlin, German foreign minister Johann Wadephul briefed reporters alongside his Israeli counterpart Gideon Saar after marking 80 years since the Holocaust. Saar said “only Hamas is responsible for the suffering of both Israelis and Palestinians” and for the continuation of the war. Wadephul, though, decried both the ongoing humanitarian situation in Gaza, as well as the recent Israeli government approval of new settlements in the West Bank. “We cannot ignore that as friends and turn a blind eye on that, and I need to clearly say we reject that, because this settlement policies is contrary to international law and it literally creates literal obstacles to a two-state solution,” Wadephul said, while also warning against those in Israel calling for annexation of the West Bank. Some analysts argue such rhetoric should have come sooner. “If Israel is still reeling from Hamas’s atrocities nearly twenty months ago and the hostages’ continued torment, coming to terms with the appalling suffering the subsequent assault has inflicted on Gaza will scar Israeli society for decades,” noted a statement from the International Crisis Group. “A better and braver friend would have spoken out earlier and louder.” It’s still unclear what Europe’s capitals may concretely do to match their words with action. “For now, the E.U. is far from having the unanimity required to fully suspend ties,” my colleagues wrote last week. “Some economic measures, however, could pass, if there is backing from enough member states. Any punitive measures could run up against divisions in the bloc, whose 27 member states have wildly different sensibilities on the war, spanning the spectrum from pro-Israeli Hungary to pro-Palestinian Ireland.” “The Europeans don’t have much leverage and what they do have they still seem unwilling to use,” Jeremy Shapiro, director of research at the European Council on Foreign Relations, told me. “In the end, it is a meaningful moment in Europe’s relationship with Israel, but it is mostly performative and not likely to alter Israeli behavior.” | 
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