PARIS/RAMALLAH: French President Emmanuel Macron Monday urged "reform" of the Palestinian Authority as part of a plan for the West Bank-based body to govern a post-war Gaza without Hamas. France is among European nations to have backed a plan for Gaza to return to the control of the Ramallah-based authority after nearly two decades of Hamas rule if a ceasefire deal is reached to end the Zionist entity's attacks on the territory.

The entity resumed its deadly air strikes in Gaza on March 18 after cutting off aid to the Palestinian coastal territory, ending a two-month ceasefire. Macron called his Palestinian counterpart Mahmoud Abbas on Monday after last week announcing France could take the unprecedented step of recognizing a Palestinian state in coming months, sparking ire from the Zionist entity.

"France is fully mobilized to obtain the return of all hostages, the return of a lasting ceasefire and immediate access for humanitarian aid into Gaza," Macron said on X after the phone call.

"It is essential to set a framework for the day after: disarm and sideline Hamas, define credible governance and reform the Palestinian Authority," he said. "This should allow progress towards a two-state political solution, with a view to the peace conference in June, in the service of peace and security for all." Macron has said France could recognize Palestine during a United Nations conference in New York in June.

Palestinian news agency WAFA reported that Abbas and Macron had "emphasized the urgent need for a ceasefire, the acceleration of humanitarian aid delivery, the rejection of the displacement of the Palestinian people from their land". France has thrown its support behind a plan put forward by Arab nations, including Jordan, to rebuild Gaza without evicting its 2.4 million Palestinian residents. The Arab League-endorsed plan was put forward to counter a US proposal to send the war-ravaged territory's inhabitants elsewhere.

'Gravely mistaken'

Abbas and Macron called for an "urgent" ceasefire in Gaza, as Hamas said it is prepared to free all hostages provided it receives guarantees the Zionist entity will end the war. Senior Hamas official Taher Al-Nunu indicated that the group was willing to release all hostages in exchange for a "serious prisoner swap". "The issue is not the number of captives," Al-Nunu said, "but rather that the occupation is reneging on its commitments, blocking the implementation of the ceasefire agreement and continuing the war". "Hamas has therefore stressed the need for guarantees to compel the occupation to uphold the agreement," he added after the group held talks with Egyptian and Qatari mediators in Cairo. However, he said Hamas will not give up its arms. "The weapons of the resistance are not up for negotiation," Al-Nunu said.

Hamas has governed the Gaza Strip since 2007, when it seized control from the Palestinian Authority after it blocked Hamas from exercising real power despite winning a parliamentary election the previous year. Both France and the United States under Joe Biden have pressed for the Palestinian Authority, which has limited autonomy in parts of the West Bank, to root out corruption and bring in new faces in the hope it could take charge of Gaza.

The Ramallah-based administration, led by 89-year-old Abbas, has been hamstrung by the Zionist entity's decades-old occupation of the West Bank and the Palestinian president's own unpopularity.

Paris has long championed a two-state solution. But formal recognition of a Palestinian state would mark a major policy switch and risk antagonizing the entity, which insists such moves by foreign states are premature. Macron's remarks last week sparked a wave of criticism from right-wing groups in France and from Netanyahu and his son Yair Netanyahu. "President Macron is gravely mistaken in continuing to promote the idea of a Palestinian state in the heart of our land — a state whose sole aspiration is the destruction of (the Zionist entity)," Netanyahu said in a statement.

Zionist teacher Nurit Sperling told AFP, in French, that Macron "absolutely shouldn't have done that". "I think we saw on October 7 that it's not feasible. We can't live like this, next to them, in this way," she said, referring to Hamas's October 7, 2023 attack on the Zionist entity. The United States has also long resisted recognition of a Palestinian state. Qatari Amir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani and Egypt's President Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi met in Doha where they supported creating a Palestinian state. The two leaders "emphasized the centrality of the Palestinian cause as the foremost Arab issue". — AFP