Why Macron's Popularity Is on the Rise Again

French President Emmanuel Macron arrives to attend a European Union leaders summit in Brussels, Belgium, December 14, 2017. REUTERS/Francois Lenoir
French President Emmanuel Macron arrives to attend a European Union leaders summit in Brussels, Belgium, December 14, 2017. REUTERS/Francois Lenoir
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Why Macron's Popularity Is on the Rise Again

French President Emmanuel Macron arrives to attend a European Union leaders summit in Brussels, Belgium, December 14, 2017. REUTERS/Francois Lenoir
French President Emmanuel Macron arrives to attend a European Union leaders summit in Brussels, Belgium, December 14, 2017. REUTERS/Francois Lenoir

Emmanuel Macron, France's youngest ever president turns 40 this week and he turned around his flagging popularity rating with rising poll numbers and a growing international reputation.

A few months ago, French President Emmanuel Macron looked to have lost his Midas touch. But as he turns 40 this week, he has rising poll numbers and a growing international reputation to celebrate.

Seven months into his presidency, the centrist has forced through a first wave of pro-business reforms with only mild resistance and has reversed what some feared might be a terminal slide in his popularity.

A survey out on Tuesday by the Odoxa polling company showed that 54 percent of French people had a positive view of him, up nine points in a month, while Prime Minister Edouard Philippe has an approval rating of 57 percent.

"Before they used to fall and then never come back, but he's rebounding," Pascal Perrineau, a veteran political science professor at Sciences Po university in Paris, told AFP.

In August and September, Macron was polling in the mid-30s, a record slump for a new president which seemed to show that grumpy French were already fed up with their new and inexperienced leader.

Many commentators viewed him as detached from the everyday concerns of average citizens, while others denounced his tax and economic plans as mainly benefiting the well-off.

But the turnaround in his fortunes has led to a reappraisal of France's youngest-ever president, who will celebrate his 40th birthday on Thursday.

The reasons include his assured handling of the recent deaths of two major cultural figures, the writer Jean d'Ormesson and the singer Johnny Hallyday -- a rock icon for whom hundreds of thousands turned out on the streets of Paris in tribute.

Macron also continues to benefit from the weakness of his political opponents and divisions among the country's once-mighty trade unions, which have shown plenty of bark but no bite over his first pro-market reforms.

Meanwhile, France is showing its strongest economic growth in years and the wider European area is pulling out of its stagnation since the 2008-09 financial crisis.

But analysts and observers see at least three other reasons for the Macron recovery which reveal more about the sort of president the French elected when they voted for the little-known former economy minister in May.



The Latest Child to Starve to Death in Gaza Weighed Less than When She Was Born

Ahmed Abu Halib and his wife Esraa Abu Halib, left, mourn over the body of their 5-month-old baby, Zainab, who died from malnutrition-related causes, according to the family and the hospital, during her funeral outside the Nasser Hospital, in Khan Younis, Gaza Strip, Saturday, July 26, 2025. (AP)
Ahmed Abu Halib and his wife Esraa Abu Halib, left, mourn over the body of their 5-month-old baby, Zainab, who died from malnutrition-related causes, according to the family and the hospital, during her funeral outside the Nasser Hospital, in Khan Younis, Gaza Strip, Saturday, July 26, 2025. (AP)
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The Latest Child to Starve to Death in Gaza Weighed Less than When She Was Born

Ahmed Abu Halib and his wife Esraa Abu Halib, left, mourn over the body of their 5-month-old baby, Zainab, who died from malnutrition-related causes, according to the family and the hospital, during her funeral outside the Nasser Hospital, in Khan Younis, Gaza Strip, Saturday, July 26, 2025. (AP)
Ahmed Abu Halib and his wife Esraa Abu Halib, left, mourn over the body of their 5-month-old baby, Zainab, who died from malnutrition-related causes, according to the family and the hospital, during her funeral outside the Nasser Hospital, in Khan Younis, Gaza Strip, Saturday, July 26, 2025. (AP)

A mother pressed a final kiss to what remained of her five-month-old daughter and wept. Esraa Abu Halib's baby now weighed less than when she was born.

On a sunny street in shattered Gaza, the bundle containing Zainab Abu Halib represented the latest death from starvation after 21 months of war and Israeli restrictions on aid.

The baby was brought to the pediatric department of Nasser Hospital on Friday. She was already dead. A worker at the morgue carefully removed her Mickey Mouse-printed shirt, pulling it over her sunken, open eyes. He pulled up the hems of her pants to show her knobby knees. His thumb was wider than her ankle. He could count the bones of her chest.

The girl had weighed over 3 kilograms (6.6 pounds) when she was born, her mother said. When she died, she weighed less than 2 kilograms (4.4 pounds).

A doctor said it was a case of "severe, severe starvation."

She was wrapped in a white sheet for burial and placed on the sandy ground for prayers. The bundle was barely wider than the imam’s stance. He raised his open hands and invoked Allah once more.

Zainab was one of 85 children to die of malnutrition-related causes in Gaza in the past three weeks, according to the latest toll released by the territory’s Health Ministry on Saturday. Another 42 adults died of malnutrition-related causes in the same period, it said.

"She needed a special baby formula which did not exist in Gaza," Zainab's father, Ahmed Abu Halib, told The Associated Press as he prepared for her funeral prayers in the hospital’s courtyard in the southern city of Khan Younis.

Dr. Ahmed al-Farah, head of the pediatric department, said the girl had needed a special type of formula that helps with babies allergic to cow's milk.

He said she hadn't suffered from any diseases, but the lack of the formula led to chronic diarrhea and vomiting. She wasn’t able to swallow as her weakened immune system led to a bacterial infection and sepsis, and quickly lost more weight.

'Many will follow'

The child's family, like many of Gaza's Palestinians, lives in a tent, displaced. Her mother, who also has suffered from malnutrition, said she breastfed the girl for only six weeks before trying to feed her formula.

"With my daughter’s death, many will follow," she said. "Their names are on a list that no one looks at. They are just names and numbers. We are just numbers. Our children, whom we carried for nine months and then gave birth to, have become just numbers." Her loose robe hid her own weight loss.

The arrival of children suffering from malnutrition has surged in recent weeks, al-Farah said. His department, with a capacity of eight beds, has been treating about 60 cases of acute malnutrition. They have placed additional mattresses on the ground.

Another malnutrition clinic, affiliated with the hospital, receives an average of 40 cases weekly, he said.

"Unless the crossings are opened and food and baby formula are allowed in for this vulnerable segment of Palestinian society, we will witness unprecedented numbers of deaths," he warned.

Doctors and aid workers in Gaza blame Israel’s restrictions on the entry of aid and medical supplies. Food security experts warn of famine in the territory of over 2 million people.

‘Shortage of everything’

After ending the latest ceasefire in March, Israel cut off the entry of food, medicine, fuel and other supplies completely to Gaza for 2 ½ months, saying it aimed to pressure Hamas to release hostages.

Under international pressure, Israel slightly eased the blockade in May. Since then, it has allowed in around 4,500 trucks for the UN and other aid groups to distribute, including 2,500 tons of baby food and high-calorie special food for children, Israel's Foreign Ministry said last week. Israel says baby formula has been included, plus formula for special needs.

The average of 69 trucks a day, however, is far below the 500 to 600 trucks a day the UN says are needed for Gaza. The UN says it has been unable to distribute much of the aid because hungry crowds and gangs take most of it from its arriving trucks.

Separately, Israel has backed the US-registered Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, which in May opened four centers distributing boxes of food supplies. More than 1,000 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces since May while trying to get food, mostly near those new aid sites, the UN human rights office says.

Much of Gaza's population now relies on aid.

"There was a shortage of everything," the mother of Zainab said as she grieved. "How can a girl like her recover?"