France hosts push to revive two-state solution amid Middle East war

Israeli and Palestinian peacebuilders gathered at the Institut du Monde Arabe in Paris on Friday as France tried to keep the two-state solution from slipping further out of reach. Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot convened the meeting with foreign ministers and senior officials from dozens of countries, aiming to produce concrete recommendations before the G7 summit in Évian.

The gathering landed as a deliberate anniversary moment for French diplomacy. France described it as the first anniversary of the Paris Call for a Two-State Solution, a year after the wider push that produced the New York Declaration on the Peaceful Settlement of the Question of Palestine and the Implementation of the Two-State Solution. That declaration came out of a July 2025 international conference organized by France and Saudi Arabia and was later endorsed by the United Nations General Assembly on September 12, 2025, by a vote of 142 in favor, 10 against and 12 abstentions.

France has used that diplomatic track to keep the issue visible even as the regional war has deepened the political cost of compromise. In July 2025, the French foreign ministry said France would recognize the State of Palestine in September, a move meant to sustain pressure for a negotiated settlement and keep the two-state framework alive in international forums.

The Paris meeting underscored how much of the remaining momentum now sits outside formal negotiations. Israeli and Palestinian civil society representatives were brought into the same room as ministers and senior officials, signaling that peace efforts are still being carried by activists and peacebuilders trying to preserve space for dialogue, even as political leaders remain stalled. Their role is increasingly limited, but the message in Paris was clear: the people still pushing for coexistence have not abandoned the field, even if they have little sway over the decisions of governments.

French officials said the context for two-state diplomacy had worsened over the past year, sharpening the tension between official optimism and conditions on the ground. By putting civil society at the center of the discussion, Paris sought to show that the framework has not fully closed, even as violence across the Middle East makes an agreement harder to imagine and easier to postpone.