France to host international meet on Israeli-Palestinian conflict in June

A billboard by Israeli anti-occupation group Peace Now, welcoming US President Joe Biden, hangs on a building in the coastal city of Tel Aviv, ahead of his visit this week, July 11, 2022. (Files / AFP)

• A video message by the French foreign minister was played to a gathering of peace activists in the Israeli city of Tel Aviv

TEL AVIV: France will host an international meeting in June dedicated to the long-touted two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the French foreign minister announced on Thursday.
“On September 22 last year, France took the momentous decision to recognize the State of Palestine and will host an international conference in Paris on June 12 so that Israeli and Palestinian civil societies can make their voices heard,” Jean-Noel Barrot said in a video message played to a gathering of peace activists in the Israeli city of Tel Aviv.
The “People’s Peace Summit” in Tel Aviv was organized by the “It’s Time” coalition, a grouping of more than 80 peacebuilding organizations working to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict through a political agreement guaranteeing both peoples’ right to self-determination and secure lives.
Several hundred people attended the meeting in Tel Aviv, AFP journalists reported.
“While the Middle East remains deeply scarred by the terrorist attacks of October 7 (2023) in Israel, by more than two and a half years of devastating war in Gaza and by a humanitarian crisis that, sadly, shows no sign of abating, your presence here is an act of resistance against fatalism and resignation,” Barrot said.
Barrot’s remarks come as the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, one of the most right-wing in Israel’s history, vehemently opposes the emergence of a sovereign and fully independent Palestinian state in the occupied West Bank and Gaza, and is working on the ground to undermine the possibility of a two-state solution.