The major French newspapers covered what they described as the unprecedented attack launched by Hamas resistance movement from the Gaza Strip on Israel, although they differed in the angle of dealing with it, as Le Monde saw that it aimed to reshuffle the cards in the conflict with Israel, and Le Figaro followed it by saying that it could frustrate the hoped-for reshaping of the Middle East, while L’Obs magazine was concerned with drawing the first lessons from it, while Liberation headlined that it caused a fatal surprise in an endless conflict.
Le Monde began – in an article by its veteran correspondent Benjamin Bart – that the date chosen by Hamas to attack Israel wasn’t a coincidence, because it brings back to the Arab imagination, through Hamas forces’ penetration of the fortified fence surrounding the Gaza Strip, what was the Egyptian forces’ crossing of the Bar Lev line.
It was fortified 50 years ago, which changed the balance of Israeli-Arab power, and was a shock to the Israeli psyche.
Although it is too early to guess the exact consequences of this new conflict – according to the author – the scale of the attack carried out by Hamas isn’t at all proportional to the operations it has carried out since 2007, which means that the Middle East is witnessing a new political and security earthquake, and that the setback that befell Israel, as it happened in 1973, it’s characterized by incredible, symbolic brutality.
According to the article, the fact that the Israeli political and security establishment remained paralyzed, as if it had been in a state of astonishment all morning, indicates a miserable failure, especially since the Israeli intelligence services didn’t expect anything to come, even though an attack of this size requires months of preparation.
However, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who presents himself as the protector of Israel’s protection and security, he must give this catastrophe a personal dimension, and he must be held accountable after the initial shock and loneliness that should prevail for a few days.
The article concluded that the new war in Gaza will have a regional resonance, and may be a direct blow to the Israeli-Arab normalization process, because the images of the bombing of Gaza promise to incite Arab public opinion and attack its leaders, especially those who have established relations with Israel, and thus Hamas’ message to the countries of the region and Western embassies.
It’s clear that there will be no stability in the Middle East without Palestine.
In the same context, Le Figaro believed that this unprecedented attack could thwart the hoped-for restructuring of the Middle East, but she focused on the extensions of the conflict that the attack could cause, and commented that the Lebanese Hezbollah congratulated Hamas on its “heroic, large-scale operation,” and said, “The leadership of the Islamic Resistance in Lebanon is in direct contact with the leadership of the Palestinian Resistance at home and abroad and is constantly evaluating events and the progress of operations”.
Le Figaro asked: Does this mean that the pro-Iranian militia has an interest in opening a front against northern Israel?
Le Figaro responded that perhaps not, because Hezbollah, which recently concluded an agreement to share gas reserves in the Mediterranean with Israel – according to the newspaper – didn’t make a decision to launch simultaneous attacks against the Jewish state, although there is no doubt about the cooperation between it and Hamas.
However, Le Figaro saw that Iran has an interest in the outbreak of Israeli-Palestinian violence, and responded to this for a simple reason, which it said Tehran doesn’t hide, which is that the Islamic Republic looks dimly at the continuing rapprochement between its new ally, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, and Israel, and it warned by saying that those who conclude an agreement With Israel, they are betting on the wrong horse.
As for L’Obs magazine, the catastrophic situation in Israel as the most dangerous since the October 1973 War, and said that Israel is in a state of shock and astonishment at this “terrorist” attack, and said, Israel is preparing for a long war and perhaps a ground invasion on the Gaza Strip.
