French aviation authorities have suspended, until further notice, an air-traffic controller who earlier this week said “Free Palestine” to an inbound El Al flight nearing Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris, the country’s transportation minister said.
“The person has been identified as an air-traffic controller. His access to carrying out [his role] has been suspended until further notice. A disciplinary procedure has been immediately initiated. The punishment must match the seriousness of the acts,” French Minister for Transport Philippe Tabarot wrote on X.
“An analysis of the recordings confirmed the facts,” as reported by El Al to the French authorities, the minister continued. Using air-traffic control communications for unrelated purposes is forbidden under the International Air Traffic Control (ATC) protocol, which is based on the standards set by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO).
Separately, a diplomatic source in France’s Foreign Ministry on Wednesday told JNS that Paris was delaying visas for El Al security personnel because of how “French diplomatic personnel in Israel and Jerusalem have been subject to systematic checks by Israeli security agents at Roissy Airport for El Al flights.”
The source, who declined to be identified, would not elaborate on the nature of the checks or France’s presumed objections to them.
“A dialogue has been initiated with the Israeli Embassy in France to resolve these difficulties,” the source said. “In the meantime, several administrative measures related to this system have been temporarily suspended. Dialogue is continuing with a view to quickly finding a solution that meets the concerns of both parties.”
Israel’s Embassy in Paris had asked the French Foreign Ministry to resolve delays in the renewal of stay permits for security personnel working for El Al, a spokesperson for Israel’s Foreign Ministry confirmed to JNS on Tuesday.
The request followed media reports on Monday that French authorities had been holding up renewals for the past six months to punish Israel for its war on Hamas in Gaza, which France has called to wrap up. The French diplomat interviewed by JNS declined to address these claims.
The report did not say whether the delays had affected the ability of El Al security staff to carry out their duties.
Unidentified persons last week used a stencil and red paint to leave graffiti that read “El Al genocide airline” at the company’s Paris offices. They also wrote: “Palestine will live, Palestine will win” on the entrance, on which they’d thrown red paint.
Following the Hamas-led terrorist attacks in Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, French-Israeli relations have deteriorated dramatically. In the invasion, Hamas terrorists murdered some 1,200 people and triggered an ongoing Israeli military campaign to dismantle Hamas and free all of the 251 hostages the terrorist group had taken.
French President Emmanuel Macron was initially supportive of Israel but soon after called on Jerusalem to stand down both in Gaza and in Lebanon, where Hezbollah began firing rockets into Israel on Oct. 8, 2023.
France said on July 24 that it intends to recognize a Palestinian state in September, leading other European and Western countries to declare the same. France has also imposed an arms embargo on Israel, and Macron suggested in November 2023 that Israel’s actions in Gaza were “barbarism.”
