When French President Emmanuel Macron visited Jerusalem's Old City Wednesday, he also trod in the footsteps of one of his predecessors, Jacques Chirac, by engaging in a heated argument with Israeli security.
The French tricolor has flown over the Church of St. Anne in Jerusalem’s walled Old City since it was gifted by the Ottomans to French Emperor Napoleon III in 1856. The Roman Catholic church, located at the start of Via Dolorosa in the Old City's Muslim Quarter, has been part of France's territories in the Palestinian territories since the 1850s.
France views it as a provocation when Israeli police enter the church’s sandstone complex, in a part of Jerusalem captured and annexed by Israel in the 1967 Middle East war.
Video showed Macron, jostled in the center of a crowded circle between his own protective detail and Israeli security personnel, including several paramilitary policemen in uniform, under an archway leading into the church.
Macron then stopped the shoving and shouted at the Israeli security guards in English: “I don’t like what you did in front of me.”
Lowering his voice, he then said: “Go outside. I’m sorry, you know the rules. Nobody has to provoke nobody.”
Speaking later to reporters, Macron said the incident ended pleasantly and that he shook hands with the Israeli security officials.
An Israeli police spokesman declined to comment on the incident. An Israeli government spokesman did not immediately comment on behalf of the Shin Bet internal security agency, which also helps guard foreign dignitaries.
French diplomats had cautioned that they want to leave little room for mishaps on Macron’s trip. Earlier on Wednesday, a separate squabble ensued when Israeli police tried to enter St. Anne ahead of Macron’s visit.
Macron is one of dozens of world leaders due to attend Thursday’s World Holocaust Forum at the Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial center in Jerusalem, which will commemorate the 75-year anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz death camp.
Wednesday's tense scenes recalled a 1996 Jerusalem visit by late former president Chirac during which he also lost his cool with Israeli security agents who were pressing him to move on.
Chirac heatedly told them their actions were a "provocation" and angrily asked: "What do you want? Me to go back to my plane and go back to France, is that what you want?"
Chirac refused to enter St. Anne until Israeli security left the site.
