For a man so keen to thrust himself onto the international stage, Emmanuel Macron has been surprisingly quiet over the last fortnight. At the beginning of 2022, the President of France shuttled across Europe in an attempt to avert conflict between Russia and Ukraine. Though his diplomatic efforts were criticised in some Anglophone quarters, Macron earned the respect of many in France for attempting to talk Vladimir Putin out of war.
Now there is another war raging but this time Macron has had little to say about the conflict between Israel and Hamas. He has offered his measured support to Israel but he has not yet followed Joe Biden, Ursula von der Leyen, Olaf Scholz and Rishi Sunak to Tel Aviv to tell Benjamin Netanyahu in person (despite saying that he plans to at some point). Macron never likes to be upstaged – particularly by his fellow European leaders – and it raises the question as to why the president is reluctant to make the trip to Israel.
The answer appears to be fear.
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