FRANCE PERSPECTIVE

Le Monde reports that France has requested an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council following the deaths of three peacekeepers in Lebanon within 24 hours. This context is crucial: Paris is not officially blocking its bases, but Trump explicitly accuses it of preventing aircraft carrying military supplies to Israel from flying over its territory. RFI details the closure of Spanish airspace and notes that aircraft based in France and the United Kingdom can no longer transit through Spain either — reconfiguring all NATO air logistics in the western Mediterranean. France maintains a posture of strategic autonomy: it does not participate in strikes, calls for a ceasefire, and welcomes Macron in Japan to discuss the economic consequences of war. But it has not taken as decisive an action as Madrid or Rome. The French position is that of a country that criticizes without forbidding — a nuance that irritates Trump without confronting him. The French position is one of theoretical strategic autonomy: Macron refuses to participate in strikes, calls for a ceasefire at the Security Council, and travels to Japan to discuss the economic consequences. But he has neither closed his bases nor his airspace — unlike Madrid and Rome. The head of Iranian diplomacy has moreover urged Saudi Arabia to expel American forces, recalling that Iranian operations target only "enemy aggressors." France, a permanent member of the Security Council, positions itself as arbiter — but an arbiter who has not yet blown the whistle.