Binyamin Netanyahu is nowhere more comfortable than traveling, in the international arena, where no elected leader can claim an experience as long as his, with fifteen years in power since 1996. In Paris on February 3 and 4, the Israeli Prime Minister made his first visit there outside the Middle East since the start of his last mandate, in December 2022. He discussed at length, with Emmanuel Macron, the means of countering the threat Iranian. He also pretended not to know, for the space of a weekend, that the Israeli house was burning down. He played down the repression and violence in which Jerusalem and the West Bank are sinking, as did criticism of his justice reform, which promises to upset the balance of power established at the birth of the state in 1948.
Iran remains a central subject for Mr. Netanyahu, who claims to discern in Paris a convergence of new views in this regard. “The concern is shared. The analysis of the nature of the regime is divided. It’s a rapprochement. I remember the years when I was almost alone in talking about the danger posed by this regimehe told Israeli media and the Worldon the sidelines of his visit. I found much more understanding, I must say, and a willingness to act together. »
This rapprochement, confirmed by Paris, accelerated during the repression of recent demonstrations in Iran. Even if they go out for the time being in the depths of winter, they have been the most significant since the 1979 revolution, according to Israeli military intelligence. The violence of the repression ended to ruin the negotiations carried out since 2021 in order to revive the international Iranian nuclear agreement. Mr. Netanyahu asks for nothing better. In 2018, he convinced US President Donald Trump to torpedo this agreement. Then he urged him to order strikes against Iranian nuclear facilities at the end of his term in 2020.
In this new phase that is opening, Mr. Netanyahu seems to be part of a common front. He asked France to contribute, alongside Washington, to increasing military deterrence. It does not mention keystrokes, which would cause a switch to ” another world “, he simply evaded facing Emmanuel Macron, according to a French connoisseur of the file. Israeli PM says he wants action ” contact details “ and is pleased to hear the French President “consider imposing sanctions on Iran’s Revolutionary Guards”the ideological army of the regime.
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