Gallant says Israel won't join Lebanon solution committee if Paris in it

Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant on Friday said Israel will not join a trilateral framework proposed by France to defuse tensions with Lebanon, accusing Paris of “hostile policies against Israel.”

“While the State of Israel is fighting the most just war in its history, France has shown hostility and enmity against us, while blatantly ignoring the atrocities committed by Hamas’ terrorists against children and women -- just because they are Jews,” Gallant said in a post on the X platform.

“We will not be partners in the committee to regulate the security situation on the northern border if France takes part in it,” he added.

Gallant published another post on the X platform, this time in English, in which he openly said that Israel “will not be a party to the trilateral framework proposed by France.”

An Israeli official, quoted by Al-Arabiya’s Al-Hadath channel, later said that the idea to create a U.S-French-Israeli framework had been initiatlly proposed by Israel.

“After it (France) banned us from taking part in an arms exhibition, we will not discuss Lebanon’s file with it,” the official said.

“We will discuss Lebanon’s file with Washington and not with France,” the official added.

French President Emmanuel Macron had overnight said that his country, the United States and Israel would work together to ease tensions along the Israeli-Lebanese border.

France has been making diplomatic efforts to contain the volatile situation since January, as Hezbollah traded daily fire with Israel since the Israel-Hamas war began on Oct. 7.

In recent weeks, cross-border exchanges have escalated, raising fears of a regional conflagration.

Speaking at a G7 summit Thursday in Italy, Macron said the three countries would "move forward on the road map that we have proposed. We will do the same with the Lebanese authorities."

The French proposal involves halting attacks on both sides and militants withdrawing 10 kilometers from the border, according to Lebanese officials.

Informed diplomatic sources meanwhile told al-Joumhouria newspaper, in remarks published Friday, that a tripartite American-French-Israeli summit will be held soon, in an effort to stop the war in Gaza and South Lebanon.