President Emmanuel Macron of France says he will formally recognize a Palestinian state as the United Nations General Assembly convenes next week, part of a broad diplomatic push he has spearheaded in an attempt to salvage a two-state solution with Israel that looks as distant as ever.
The plan, hatched with the Saudis over the last six months, is meant to provide a road map for rebuilding Gaza and securing a peace after the end of the Gaza war, which is close to entering its third year. It has gained support from 142 countries.
Since Mr. Macron announced in July that he would recognize Palestine, more than a half-dozen countries have followed suit, including Canada and Britain, whose prime minister, Keir Starmer, is expected to make his pronouncement this weekend.
The rest are expected to make their declarations on Monday during a summit at the United Nations the day before the General Assembly officially opens.
But even the plan’s staunchest backers in Mr. Macron’s inner circle concede that it misses the essential element: any hint of backing by Israel or the United States.
That has made the effort by Mr. Macron seem destined to join more than 75 years of failed diplomacy since the United Nations in 1947 first called for the creation of an Arab state alongside a Jewish state.
Nonetheless, Mr. Macron and his diplomatic team insist that the diplomacy is worth the effort, even if others consider it quixotic, however well intended.
“The ingredients required to test the possibility of a two-state solution are simply not there,” said Aaron David Miller, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
“I have no objection to the substantive elements of what the Saudis and French are prepared to do,” added Mr. Miller, who was formerly an adviser to U.S. secretaries of state on Arab-Israeli negotiations. “But it’s wholly untethered from the current reality.”
That reality includes a ground assault by Israeli forces on central Gaza City this week that has already displaced hundreds of thousands of Palestinians; a recent declaration by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel that “there will be no Palestinian state”; and wholesale condemnation from the Trump administration, which has worked behind the scenes to pressure allies not to sign on to the plan.
This week, while visiting Jerusalem, Secretary of State Marco Rubio dismissed any move to recognize a Palestine state as symbolic and said it would only make Hamas “feel more emboldened.” He warned that a fresh push for Palestinian statehood could provoke an Israeli backlash — a likely reference to recent calls by right-wing Israeli ministers for the annexation of the West Bank in response.
Mr. Macron and his team see the pushback as a sign that both Israel and the United States are feeling the growing pressure of international isolation.
From the beginning, Mr. Macron has said that only a strong political commitment to Palestinian statehood could open the way to a two-state peace, persuade Hamas to lay down its arms and eventually advance the region toward stability.
His recognition of a Palestinian state is intimately tied to a 42-point “day after” plan developed with the Saudis, which sets out “tangible, time-bound and irreversible steps” toward a two-state solution once a cease-fire is declared.
The plan, also known as the “New York Declaration,” was approved by 142 countries at the General Assembly this month.
Its practical steps include the establishment of a “transitional administrative committee” to oversee governance, and the creation of a stabilization force under the aegis of the United Nations to provide security. Details on which countries would offer up troops remain to be hammered out, French diplomats said.
It condemns the Oct. 7 attack on Israel by Hamas in 2023 as well as the forced displacement of Palestinians, and it calls for the release of all remaining Israeli hostages by Hamas. It also demands that Hamas “must end its rule in Gaza and hand over its weapons.”
Given that the document was signed by many Arab and Middle Eastern countries, including traditional allies of Hamas, Mr. Macron’s team considers the agreement a breakthrough.
But, much like the plan Mr. Macron has spearheaded with a “coalition of the willing” for securing a prospective peace in Ukraine, the day-after plan for Gaza depends on the participation of the United States. And it requires buy-in from a recalcitrant Israeli government and from Hamas, which so far has refused to disarm.
It was conceived with the understanding that only the United States has leverage to stop the war, given Israel’s dependence on American arms, said Rym Momtaz, editor in chief of the Strategic Europe blog run by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
“France and Saudi Arabia are providing the most constructive concrete assist they can to enable President Trump to achieve the peace he promised, and also regional normalization,” said Ms. Momtaz, an expert on French foreign policy.
Though she believed the plan’s realism was its strength, she also sees it as its “biggest weakness, because America isn’t playing ball.”
Mr. Miller, the former peace negotiator, said the French and Saudis are “not reading Trump correctly.”
“The missing ingredient is Trump’s capacity, will and desire to essentially take on Benjamin Netanyahu,” he said. “I’ve seen nothing in the past nine months to indicate to me that when it comes to Gaza and Hamas, Trump is prepared to press Israel.”
For decades, support for a two-state solution has been official United States policy. But successive American governments also believed that Palestinian statehood should be realized after full peace negotiations settled between Israel and the Palestinians, not through unilateral declarations or U.N. resolutions.
Last year, the United States blocked the U.N. Security Council from moving forward on a Palestinian bid to be recognized as a full member state at the United Nations. Linda Thomas-Greenfield, then U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, explained that “Palestinians don’t have control over a significant portion of what is supposed to be their state. It’s being controlled by a terrorist organization,” she said, referring to Hamas.
The United Nations has continually supported the idea of a Palestinian state, and the idea has underpinned peace negotiations over decades. The Oslo Accords, signed between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization in 1993, laid out a timeline for Palestinian self-determination, which was dashed by violence and mistrust.
In 2006, Hamas, which does not recognize Israel’s right to exist, won the Palestinian legislative elections, then seized control of Gaza. Years later came the Oct. 7 attack, when Hamas fighters killed some 1,200 people in Israel and took 250 people hostage.
Since then, Israel’s war on Hamas has led to widespread destruction, hunger and the death of about 65,000 people in Gaza, according to Gazan health officials, who do not distinguish between civilians and combatants.
Recognizing a Palestinian state before the conclusion of a peace process inverts the traditional pattern, said Max Rodenbeck, Israel-Palestine project director for the International Crisis Group in London.
“The trouble is on the ground; the actual state people are talking about is shrinking by the minute,” he said. “Since Oct. 7 on the West Bank alone, the amount of new territory taken by Israeli settlers is about three times the size of Gaza.”
More than 140 countries in the world have already recognized a Palestinian state, including Spain, Ireland and Norway, which did so last year.
What makes France different, perhaps, is its emotional and historical bond to Israel, as well as its diplomatic stature. France is home to the largest Jewish and Muslim populations in Western Europe, and it is the only nuclear power and only permanent member of the Security Council in the European Union.
The symbolism of France’s recognizing Palestine was important to the Arab states, offering Mr. Macron some leverage to get commitments from them, Ms. Momtaz said.
Those included the public pronouncements by the president of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas, who called on Hamas, its bitter rival, to “hand over its weapons,” immediately free all hostages, and leave Gaza.
The Palestinian leader vowed to hold elections in 2026 and to reform the Palestinian Authority, which administers parts of the West Bank.
He also promised to strip the Palestinian education curriculum of hate speech and incitement, something that addresses a key concern for many Israelis, according to Dahlia Scheindlin, a political analyst and public opinion expert who has worked on peace campaigns in Israel for many decades.
She called the plan “valuable” and said some of its points could be “advanced by individual member states or maybe they can contribute to changing bilateral relations, and yes, they can be a signpost for where to go.”
After his pronouncement on Monday, Mr. Macron has scheduled meetings with partners at the United Nations to continue working on the plan. Among his team, there is hope that pressure from Arab countries might push the American president to act.
But even the plan’s backers understand that is a long shot.
“It’s a gesture of despair,” said Gérard Araud, a former French ambassador to Israel, United States and the United Nations. “We are heading toward a disaster; we are trying to stop it.”
Catherine Porter is an international reporter for The Times, covering France. She is based in Paris.
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