French President Emmanuel Macron sparked a diplomatic clash at the UN General Assembly after a translated remark about Hamas drew sharp corrections from Israeli and American officials, and a hasty clarification from Paris.
Macron told world leaders Tuesday at the 81st session of the UN General Assembly in New York that "Hamas was never active in the West Bank," a statement that Israeli UN Ambassador Danny Danon, U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee, and Israel's Minister of Diaspora and Combating Antisemitism Amichai Chickli all publicly challenged within hours. The French Foreign Ministry later walked back the remark, telling Fox News Digital that Macron "meant to say that Hamas does not govern the West Bank" and that "his remarks should therefore not be misinterpreted."
Whether the problem was translation or conviction, the damage was immediate. Danon fired back on X, writing that Macron "claimed from the UN podium that Hamas has 'never been active' in Judea and Samaria. Just two days ago, a French citizen was murdered there. Mr. President, Emmanuel Macron, do your homework before lecturing Israel. Check the facts."
Huckabee amplified the pushback by reposting Chickli's social media response and adding his own assessment. "Hard to imagine a more out of touch with reality speech than Macron at UN," Huckabee wrote. He added that Hamas "is an evil scourge, and they have killed innocent American citizens."
Chickli's post supplied the factual rebuttal Paris could not easily dismiss. He wrote that "since 1990, Hamas has carried out more than 80 lethal terrorist attacks originating in or directed from Judea and Samaria, murdering more than 350 Israeli civilians." That record, spanning more than three decades, sits awkwardly next to any claim, translated or otherwise, that Hamas has had no presence in the territory.
The French Foreign Ministry's cleanup effort narrowed the claim from activity to governance: Hamas does not run the West Bank the way it ran Gaza before the October 7 attacks. That distinction may be technically accurate, but it was not what audiences in the General Assembly hall heard. And it did nothing to address the broader thrust of Macron's speech, which accused Israel of violating Palestinian rights in the West Bank, undermining Lebanese sovereignty, and razing villages in southern Lebanon.
Macron also questioned the credibility of the international community's recognition of Palestinian statehood, calling the situation "shameful" and declaring that "some claim that peace has been achieved." The French president framed himself as a critic of both sides, but his sharpest language landed squarely on Israel.
Macron was far from alone. The opening day of the 81st General Assembly session turned into a procession of world leaders competing to deliver the harshest indictment of Israeli conduct in Gaza and the West Bank. The rhetorical escalation came as the world approaches three years since the Hamas attacks of October 7 and the Israeli military response that followed.
UN Secretary-General António Guterres, delivering what he said was his final address as secretary-general, described the situation in Gaza as "a scale of killing and destruction unlike anything I have witnessed in all my years as Secretary-General." He urged the assembly not to "lose sight of the devastating situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territory." Guterres also lamented the conflict in Sudan, where an estimated 150,000 people have been killed in a civil war the rest of the world has largely ignored.
The volatile political atmosphere surrounding this year's General Assembly extended beyond the hall itself. The New York Post reported that New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani had previously explored having the NYPD arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu based on an International Criminal Court indictment, a move that inflamed protest risks and drew bipartisan criticism. Mamdani called Netanyahu a "war criminal," though the city later admitted it lacked the authority to carry out any such arrest.
King Abdullah II of Jordan, a longtime U.S. ally whose country signed a peace agreement with Israel in 1994, accused Israel of committing war crimes. He described Israeli actions in the West Bank in blunt terms:
"The question is, is this the behavior of a democratic state governed by law? What is unfolding across the West Bank is not a series of isolated acts. It is elements of a single policy to compel an entire population to leave their land."
Abdullah called that policy "forced displacement" and labeled it "a war crime." He also accused Israel of targeting Jordanian field hospitals during the first 300 days of what he called the "so-called ceasefire," of destroying civilian infrastructure in Gaza, and of harboring territorial ambitions in Syria. He praised President Trump for "pushing hard for peace" but faulted Israel for "moving the goalposts."
Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva went further still, alleging that "generations of Palestinians will carry the pain and trauma left by the genocide of women and children perpetrated by Netanyahu's government in Gaza." The Hamas-run Health Ministry has reported approximately 72,000 Palestinians killed in Gaza, though many of those killed include terrorists, and independent verification of the ministry's figures remains limited. Lula da Silva also invoked former Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and former Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat as "statesmen" who sought peace, saying "they were defeated by hatred."
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan continued his pattern of comparing the situation in Gaza to Holocaust-era concentration camps, calling Gaza "the world's biggest graveyard for children." Erdoğan, a NATO ally, has made similar comparisons between Israel and Nazi Germany in previous years.
Israeli Ambassador Danon did not limit his response to Macron. Speaking to Fox News Digital, he took aim at the broader pattern of anti-Israel rhetoric at the General Assembly, calling it a familiar and predictable exercise.
"Unfortunately, it's not new, but the U.N. is obsessed with Israel. Instead of focusing and dealing with the real issues, they all gather and gang against Israel."
Danon reserved particular criticism for Erdoğan, saying the Turkish president "comes here every year, compares the Israelis to the Nazis. That's shameful. That's shameful. And he shows that he's an antisemite. He doesn't really care about the Palestinians. He just wants to sow chaos and instigate against the Jewish people."
On King Abdullah, Danon struck a more measured but still pointed tone. "He should know better. We work with Jordan, we support Jordan, we defended Jordan in the past," Danon said. "But unfortunately, many leaders, when they come here, they don't speak about the cooperation with Israel, the economical or security cooperation. They join the group and they always criticize us."
Danon credited President Trump for providing what he called moral clarity in a hostile forum. Trump's UNGA address focused heavily on Iran, with the president declaring from the dais that "Iran will never have a nuclear weapon." Trump warned the assembly to "imagine such a vile regime, wherever empowered to carry out large-scale terror attacks from behind a nuclear shield," calling it "the reality that far too many preferred to ignore."
While most speakers trained their fire on Israel, Trump reframed the debate around Iranian aggression. His speech served as a counterweight to the parade of condemnations, and Danon described it as evidence that the United States still stands with Israel when it matters most.
"[It is] the weakness of the secretary general. That is why we are grateful for President Trump, who came to the U.N., delivered a very powerful speech with moral clarity."
Trump also addressed the possibility of a deal with Iran, telling the assembly: "Do I drive them into h*** with no chance of survival and no hope of future greatness or generations?" He added: "But I believe we'll make a deal right after the election." His broader UN address covered a sweeping range of international issues, but the Iran warning was the centerpiece, and the clearest signal that Washington views Tehran, not Jerusalem, as the destabilizing force in the Middle East.
Danon summed up the annual ritual with weary directness: "Unfortunately, instead of taking practical actions to improve the world, it's much easier to blame Israel about everything."
The backdrop to these speeches remains tense. Netanyahu has vowed to attend the General Assembly later in the week despite the political hostility from New York's own city government, and Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian is scheduled to speak the following day. Danon himself commented on Mayor Mamdani's inflammatory posture toward Netanyahu, telling the New York Post: "He's very clever, but you cannot set the fire, then say this."
When a dozen world leaders spend an afternoon denouncing the same country, and the host city's mayor floats arresting its prime minister, the problem is not Israel's conduct. It is a global institution that has made scapegoating a small democracy its most reliable annual tradition.
