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From Iraq to Egypt through Lebanon and the Palestinian Territories, Jacques Chirac is a well-known and appreciated face in the Arab world.
Lebanon's friend
Lebanese politicians, journalists and netizens paid homage to Jacques Chirac, and saw in his death the death of a great " friend of Lebanon, " our Beirut correspondent Paul Khalifeh said . It is not for nothing moreover that the Lebanese call him the friend of Lebanon: Jacques Chirac was the first head of state of a great power to visit the country after the end of the civil war.
The Lebanese especially remember the decisive role played by the former French president in stopping the Israeli offensive called " Raisins of anger " in April 1996, less than two weeks after his visit to Lebanon. This war was made infamous by the Cana massacre , where 105 Lebanese civilians died in an Israeli bombing in southern Lebanon. Jacques Chirac had dispatched to the region his Foreign Minister, Hervé de Charrette, who will succeed, after an intense diplomatic party, to obtain a cease-fire.
The former French president had also built a friendly relationship with former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafic Hariri, to whom he had given unwavering support. This support resulted in the organization in Paris in 2001 of an international conference to help Lebanon financially and economically.
The following year, Jacques Chirac is in Beirut to open the summit of La Francophonie. He also played a key role in the establishment of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon to investigate the February 2005 assassination of his friend Hariri. He will live in an apartment of the family when leaving the Elysee, in 2007. The son Hariri, Saad, now Prime Minister, was also one of the first to pay tribute to Jacques Chirac.
Former French President Jacques Chirac has left, leaving behind a long history of achievements, as evidenced by our Arab and Lebanese causes. He supported the Palestinian people and their just causes
Saad Hariri (@saadhariri) September 26, 2019The Lebanese Prime Minister recalled that the former French president had supported " Lebanon in the most difficult circumstances ", by winning " first place in the defense of his freedom, independence and sovereignty ". " The Lebanese and the Arabs feel pain after the loss of a man who has deeply marked their conscience for many years, " added Saad Hariri.
Jacques Chirac was still head of state when Israel bombed Lebanon for 33 days in July and August 2006. President Michel Aoun qualified him after the announcement of his death as " faithful friend " of Lebanon, who has " worked to strengthen bilateral relations, to make them special ".
Gaza remembers ; in Ramallah, a street Jacques-Chirac
Yasser Arafat, who died in France under the benevolence of the French president, who even held his hand in denrier moments, called the latter "Doctor Chirac", for reviving the Arab and Mediterranean policy of France, in a speech in Cairo in April 1996.
The disappearance of the former President of the French Republic arouses emotion in the Gaza Strip, reports our correspondent in the Territories, Marine Vlahovic . For Jacques Chirac was considered the friend of the Palestinians and the hero of the Arabs after a brief altercation with Israeli policemen in the Old City of Jerusalem.
This day of 1996, Jacques Chirac, furious, addresses an Israeli officer: " What is still a problem? I'm getting tired of it. What do you want ? That I take the plane and that I return to France? That's what you want? So let them do it! There is no problem, no danger. It's not a method, it's provocation. Now, please stop. "
The French president threatens to shorten his official visit. He does not support the security forces hindering his career in this occupied Palestinian sector annexed by Israel. The next day, he is greeted as a hero in Ramallah, then in Gaza where the Palestinian leader invites him to inaugurate a street Charles-de-Gaulle.
Jacques Chirac moves in the old city, he tries to greet the Palestinian traders, but without success since he is literally surrounded by the Israeli security services. Journalists who follow the president's move can not approach him either, and so there is very quickly a tension up to this scene ...
Franck Weil-Rabaud, correspondent for RFI, tended the microphone in Chirac that day: "more than anecdote, a historical fact" 27/09/2019 - by RFI Play
Palestinians have never forgotten this scene in the Old City of Jerusalem, emblematic of the Arab policy that Jacques Chirac after his election in 1995. When the second Palestinian Intifada ("stone war") begins in 2000, the French leader multiplies The initiatives. But they have no effect on the unleashing of violence.
Jacques Chirac will also fail to break the isolation that Israel and the United States impose on Palestinian President Yasser Arafat. The man spends the last two years of his life besieged in his palace in Ramallah. France will finally obtain the transfer and hospitalization of Yasser Arafat in Clamart, near Paris, where he died on November 11, 2004. The president even holds Arafat's hand and talks with his wife Souha and the medical teams .
Today, a street in Ramallah bears the name of the former French president, and T-shirts have long been found in stalls in the Old City of Jerusalem bearing his likeness. Twenty-three years after his visit to Gaza, the memory remains alive in the Territories.
He thought that the Palestinian cause was a matter of justice and law. May he rest in peace.
Palestinians have lost one of the most fervent supporters of their cause, according to Tarek 27/09/2019 - by Marine Vlahovic Play
Chirac and Iraq against Bush
French opposition to the invasion of Iraq by the United States has remained in everyone's memory. Chirac and Saddam Hussein? A long story. In 1975, then Prime Minister, the French receives the Iraqi President on official visit. There is talk of building a nuclear power plant in Takrit, Iraq. In 1982, the Israeli army will bomb it.
When in March 2003 the US military launched its military operations against the Iraq of Saddam Hussein, the French president can only see the failure of his efforts. " Until the end, France and many other countries have tried to convince that the necessary disarmament of Iraq can be obtained by peaceful means. These efforts have not succeeded. "
It was impossible at that time to stop George W. Bush's US war on the United States, traumatized by the attacks of September 11, 2001, and accusing Iraq of concealing weapons of mass destruction. By the voice of Jacques Chirac and that of his Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin, France is worried about an operation carried out without the approval of the United Nations.
And at the time, the French president warned against the dangers of such an invasion: " Whatever the duration of this conflict, it will have serious consequences for the future. The French fears formulated by Jacques Chirac will prove to be justified. With the thousands of deaths of the American operation, and a whole region that is still suffering today the shock wave of the invasion of Iraq.
" We are all sorry, we offer our condolences to his family, and also to the French people. It is always sad to lose a friend, it is never nice to lose a leader who helped Iraq, saddles Iraqi Foreign Minister Mohamed Ali Alhakim on the sidelines of the General Assembly of Iraq. 'UN. President Chirac was a friend of Iraq : he opposed the war, like Germany, or Russia ... But when the war was going on, and there was the big change with the invasion of the United States, France helped us ! He received the governance council of Iraq established in July 2003, for a lunch at the Elysee ! And also, do not forget that the French have made an incredible effort to help Iraq relieve itself of its debts to the Paris Club. And they worked very hard for that. "
Yes I remember [Jacques Chirac]. For me, France in general is against the war and of the attitude, or say, of the will of the Americans to want to make war, to want to engage in all the military campaigns. This is France for me and Jacques Chirac symbolizes that I think.
An anti-war Chirac: the Baghdad street reacts 27/09/2019 - by Lucile Wassermann