The visit to Jerusalem from the French Minister of Foreign Affairs Jean-Noël Barrot was marked on Thursday by a diplomatic incident when Israeli police entered “armed” and “without authorization”according to the minister, on a site belonging to France. The head of diplomacy denounced a “unacceptable situation” and refused to enter Eleona, a pilgrimage site, while Israeli police briefly arrested two French gendarmes on the spot, an AFP journalist observed.

“I’m not going to enter (…) today, because the Israeli security forces entered it in an armed manner, without first obtaining authorization from France and without agreeing to leave.”he told reporters. “This attack on the integrity of an area under the responsibility of France is likely to weaken the ties that I had come to cultivate with Israel, at a time when we all need to move the region forward on the path to peace”.he stressed.

In heated exchanges, Israeli policemen surrounded two French gendarmes, forcibly grabbing one of them and knocking him to the ground before loading him into a police car. The officer, who had identified himself, shouted several times “Don’t touch me!”according to the AFP journalist. The two gendarmes were subsequently released, and it was not specified why the Israeli police had entered the site.

“Integrity”

The Eleona, home to a Benedictine monastery, is located on the Mount of Olives in East Jerusalem, the Palestinian part of the city occupied and annexed by Israel since 1967. Built on the so-called Pater cave, where Christ is said to have taught his disciples the Pater, it is one of four French national estates in and near Jerusalem, along with the Tomb of the Kings, the Basilica of Saint Anne and the ancient Crusader commandery of Abu Gosh with its Romanesque churches. “The Eléona estate (…) is an estate that has not only belonged to France for more than 150 years, but for which France provides security, maintenance and with enormous care.”said the Minister. “The integrity of the four areas for which France is responsible here in Jerusalem must be respected.”he insisted.

On January 22, 2020, the visit of the French president Emmanuel Macron was also marked by a stampede in front of the Basilica of Sainte-Anne. The president had shouted in English to an Israeli policeman “I don’t like what you did in front of me”. (“I don’t like what you did in front of me”). The best-known incident was in 1996, when the president Jacques Chirac also raged against Israeli soldiers who were flanking him too closely, shouting “Do you want me to go back to my plane? (before demanding that the military leave the Sainte-Anne estate.