As France hosts Lebanon aid conference, can it mediate?

Israel has been launching major airstrikes on Lebanon for the past month. According to the Lebanese authorities, the strikes have killed more than 2,000 civilians and displaced over 1 million.

The Israeli army has also killed several Hezbollah leaders, aiming to weaken the Iran-backed Shiite political party and militant group, which is based in southern Lebanon. The US, Germany and several Sunni Arab states classify Hezbollah as a terrorist group, while the European Union only describes its armed wing as terrorist.

Hezbollah has launched many missile attacks on northern Israel in support of Hamas in Gaza, since the Hamas attacks on Israel on October 7, 2023 and the beginning of the Israel-Gaza war. Tens of thousands of Israelis have fled their homes near the Lebanese border, and around 110,000 Lebanese fled the border region ahead of the Israeli escalation.

France hopes that its historically close relationship with Lebanon can help to bring about a cease-fire and long-term solution for the region. Ahead of an international aid conference in Paris on Thursday, French President Emmanuel Macron said he wanted to "provide humanitarian aid, support the international community and support the Lebanese armed forces boost security, especially in southern Lebanon."

The French Foreign Ministry said it expected representatives from Lebanon's partner states, the United Nations, the EU and other international, national and regional organizations and civil society to attend the conference to "support Lebanon's sovereignty."

"France has always had a privileged relationship with Lebanon, and this conference should contribute to a peaceful solution to the conflict," a diplomatic source, who couldn't be named, told DW in a written statement.

'We need a cease-fire'

May Maalouf Monneau, a political scientist at iReMMO, a Middle East research institute based in Paris, is hoping for something concrete to materialize.

"We need a cease-fire. Then the Lebanese army has to be sent to the south of the country to reestablish the state's authority," she told DW. "This should have happened long ago, according to the 2006 UN Resolution 1701."

That resolution ended about four weeks of war in 2006 between Israel and Hezbollah, which promised to withdraw from southern Lebanon but never did.

"France could become more present in Lebanon diplomatically because of the Paris meeting," added Maalouf Monneau. "This has not really been the case since 2005, towards the end of French President Jacques Chirac's term of office."

France, Lebanon have deep historical ties

France and Lebanon have deep political and cultural ties, said Henry Laurens, who holds the chair for contemporary history of the Arab world at the College de France in Paris.

"Since the mid-19th century, the French charity L'Oeuvre d'Orient has collected funds for educational, medical and religious organizations, especially in Lebanon," he said, adding that Lebanon was also a French protectorate from 1920 to 1943. "There is an extensive French school network in Lebanon and a large Lebanese diaspora in France."

Laurens said the French government had played an important diplomatic role in the past because it spoke to all sides. "French diplomats used to have regular talks with Hezbollah," he said, while adding that France had played this role of mediator less in recent years, partly because of its colonial history.

"There are many descendants of the colonial rulers and immigrants from the former colonies and their descendants. Also a large Muslim and Jewish community," he said. "This division is reflected in our parties, with right-wing political parties defending Israel and left-wing political groups on the side of the Palestinians. The government is paralyzed because this foreign policy issue is relevant to domestic politics as well."

Macron provokes Netanyahu's ire

According to Fabrice Balanche, a geographer and Middle East specialist at the University of Lyon 2 in southeastern France, recent statements by Macron have worsened the chances of the Lebanon conference being a success.

Macron called for an end to arms deliveries to Israel, and stressed the need for a political solution, also for the war in Gaza — provoking the ire of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who called Macron's words a "disgrace."

Israel launched a ground offensive in the Gaza Strip after Hamas, which is classified as a terrorist organization by the EU, Germany and the US, killed more than 1,100 people in attacks on October 7, 2023, and took hundreds of hostages, according to Israel, not all of whom have been freed. The Hamas-run Health Ministry in Gaza has said more than 42,000 Palestinians have died in the ensuing war, mostly civilians.

"France now has a very bad relationship with Israel," said Balanche. "Moreover, neither Hezbollah nor Israel want a cease-fire at the moment." He added that it would also be difficult to restore the authority of the Lebanese state in the country's south because the country was so unstable. "Lebanon is a failed state with a huge national debt and a corrupt elite that has not had a president since October 2022."

Furthermore, added Balanche, since 2015 it was no longer France setting the course of European policy on Lebanon, but Germany. "As a result, Macron can barely make any financial promises to Lebanon and that limits [France's] political influence." Therefore, he explained, this conference was likely to be more symbolic than anything else.

"France wants to fill the diplomatic gap created by the upcoming US presidential election," he said.

France can help 'steer the conversation'

However, Daniel Mouton from the Atlantic Council think tank in Washington believes Thursday's conference is necessary because of the "transitional period in the US." He said unlike outgoing US President Joe Biden, Macron will remain in his position for the time being and would thus be able "to help steer the conversation" during this time. 

"What the conference can do is lay out a marker of expectations of how Israeli operations in Lebanon should be constructed," he said.

"The international community, and the US has to be part of this, explicitly need to articulate what sorts of behavior, or course — a reduction in military support to Israel," Mouton added. "If operations are not conducted carefully, civilians are going to get killed. People will react to that. You could have unintended consequences where new militants spring up. Then the government of Israel risks jeopardizing its strategic objectives, its security."

Laurens, however, doubts the conference in Paris will produce more than a few pledges of funds. "And that would be an admission of weakness: If you can't do anything else, you just send humanitarian aid."

This article was originally written in German.