French Envoy Urges 'Third Way' to Break Lebanon Presidency Deadlock

Lebanon's caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati meets with former French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian in Beirut, Lebanon June 22, 2023. (Reuters)
Lebanon's caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati meets with former French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian in Beirut, Lebanon June 22, 2023. (Reuters)
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French Envoy Urges 'Third Way' to Break Lebanon Presidency Deadlock

Lebanon's caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati meets with former French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian in Beirut, Lebanon June 22, 2023. (Reuters)
Lebanon's caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati meets with former French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian in Beirut, Lebanon June 22, 2023. (Reuters)

French President Emmanuel Macron’s special envoy urged Lebanese factions to find a “third way” for electing a new president, warning that France and its allies were losing patience after almost a year of deadlock and now reviewing their financial aid.

“The life of the Lebanese state itself is at risk,” Jean-Yves Le Drian, a former foreign minister, told AFP in an interview.

Lebanon has been without a president for almost a year after ex-head of state Michel Aoun’s mandate expired, with its feuding factions repeatedly failing in parliament to elect a new leader as an unprecedented economic crisis escalates in the multi-confessional former French colony.

Both sides have put forward their own candidate - the former minister Suleiman Franjieh for the pro-Hezbollah faction and the economist Jihad Azour for their opponents - but Le Drian said neither man had any chance of breaking the deadlock.

“Neither side can prevail. Neither solution can work,” Le Drian said.

“It is important that political actors put an end to this unbearable crisis for the Lebanese and try to find a compromise solution through a third way,” he added.

‘Denial of reality’

Le Drian said he planned to go to Lebanon in the next weeks to urge the Lebanese parties to get together for an intense week of talks and then hold votes in parliament and find a new president.

Lebanon’s president is elected by parliament, where neither side has a majority, rather than by universal suffrage.

The situation is further complicated by that in the wake of the accords that ended the civil war, Lebanon’s president is always a Christian, the premier a Sunni and the speaker a Shiite.

Parliament has now failed 12 times to elect a president over the last year.

Faced with what he described as a “denial of reality” from Lebanese officials, France and its allies the United States, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Egypt, are losing patience and could review their financial support for Beirut, he said.

The five countries, whose representatives met on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly last week in New York, “are totally united, deeply irritated and questioning the sustainability of their funding to Lebanon while political leaders take pleasure in irresponsibility,” Le Drian fumed.

‘Turnaround possible’

Despite the country’s economic bankruptcy, inflation at more than 200 percent and rampant unemployment, “political leaders are in denial, which leads them to pursue tactical games at the expense of the country’s interests,” he said.

Le Drian, who was named by Macron as his special envoy in early June, has made two visits to the country in his capacity, in June and July. But he has so far failed to make any inroads in breaking the deadlock.

Macron won praise from observers for heading to the Lebanese capital in the immediate aftermath of the August 2020 Beirut port explosion to push Lebanon’s leaders into radical reform. But he now faces pressure to follow up on these promises.

Le Drian declined to put forward any name for a candidate who could break the deadlock, saying that he is only a “mediator” and that it is up to the Lebanese to identify a compromise, which he considers possible.

“I carried out a consultation which shows that the priorities of the actors can easily be forged into a consensus,” he said.

Sanctions against those who block a compromise also remain a possible weapon. “It’s obviously an idea,” he said, while insisting “a turnaround is possible”.



Israel Orders Evacuation of Area Designated as Humanitarian Zone in Gaza

 A picture taken in Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip shows smoke billowing during Israeli army operations in areas east of Khan Younis city on July 26, 2024, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas movement. (AFP)
A picture taken in Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip shows smoke billowing during Israeli army operations in areas east of Khan Younis city on July 26, 2024, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas movement. (AFP)
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Israel Orders Evacuation of Area Designated as Humanitarian Zone in Gaza

 A picture taken in Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip shows smoke billowing during Israeli army operations in areas east of Khan Younis city on July 26, 2024, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas movement. (AFP)
A picture taken in Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip shows smoke billowing during Israeli army operations in areas east of Khan Younis city on July 26, 2024, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas movement. (AFP)

Israel’s military ordered the evacuation Saturday of a crowded part of Gaza designated as a humanitarian zone, saying it is planning an operation against Hamas militants in Khan Younis, including parts of Muwasi, a makeshift tent camp where thousands are seeking refuge.

The order comes in response to rocket fire that Israel says originates from the area. It's the second evacuation issued in a week in an area designated for Palestinians fleeing other parts of Gaza. Many Palestinians have been uprooted multiple times in search of safety during Israel's punishing air and ground campaign.

On Monday, after the evacuation order, multiple Israeli airstrikes hit around Khan Younis, killing at least 70 people, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, citing figures from Nasser Hospital.

The area is part of a 60-square-kilometer (roughly 20-square-mile) “humanitarian zone” to which Israel has been telling Palestinians to flee to throughout the war. Much of the area is blanketed with tent camps that lack sanitation and medical facilities and have limited access to aid, United Nations and humanitarian groups say. About 1.8 million Palestinians are sheltering there, according to Israel's estimates. That's more than half Gaza’s pre-war population of 2.3 million.

The war in Gaza has killed more than 39,100 Palestinians, according to the territory’s Health Ministry, which doesn’t distinguish between combatants and civilians in its count. The UN estimated in February that some 17,000 children in the territory are now unaccompanied, and the number is likely to have grown since.

The war began with an assault by Hamas fighters on southern Israel on Oct. 7 that killed 1,200 people, most of them civilians, and took about 250 hostages. About 115 are still in Gaza, about a third of them believed to be dead, according to Israeli authorities.