Israel bans two French far-left leaders after France blocks West Bank official
Gideon Sa’ar barred Jean-Luc Mélenchon and Mathilde Panot from entering the country on Thursday, citing the party’s confrontational stance on Gaza.
By Nathaniel Hayes ·
Israel barred two senior French politicians from entering its territory on Thursday in a direct response to France’s recent decision to block a West Bank official from crossing its border.
Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar, who also holds the interior portfolio, announced that Jean-Luc Mélenchon, the leader of the La France Insoumise party, and Mathilde Panot, who heads its parliamentary group, would be denied entry.
The move follows an administrative ban imposed by French authorities last week on Yossi Dagan, head of the Samaria Regional Council in the northern West Bank. A French Foreign Ministry official told The Jerusalem Post that Dagan was banned due to his active role in implementing settlement policy in the West Bank.
The Israeli Foreign Ministry stated that the restrictions target the party’s extreme anti-Israel policy and the statements made by its senior officials. The ministry noted that Israel will respond firmly to those who harm it and will not allow entry to individuals who incite against the country and its citizens.
Mélenchon has positioned Israel as a central issue in his campaign for the 2027 French presidential election. Speaking at an LFI convention on November 7, he pledged that his government would pursue a confrontational policy, including deploying French naval vessels to escort pro-Palestinian flotillas to Gaza.
“We will act head-on to help the Palestinians, not only against the genocide in Gaza, but against the gradual annexation of the West Bank,” Mélenchon said. He added that French ships would escort the flotillas to assert the rights of the people.
The party’s newly released presidential platform calls for sanctions against the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the suspension of the EU’s Association Agreement with Israel. It also proposes exploring a binational state with equal rights as an alternative to the two-state solution. The party faced criticism in October 2023 for describing the Hamas-led attacks as an armed offensive, a framing it later revised by condemning the events as a terrorist act on the first anniversary.
