March against anti-Semitism: Macron denounces a “debate that had no place” on its absence

2023-11-16 02:34:28

In Switzerland for a state visit, Emmanuel Macron wanted to dot the i’s after the controversies linked to his absence from Sunday’s march against anti-Semitism. “If my position on anti-Semitism could have been ambiguous for a single second, I understand that I could have been asked to clarify it. But it never was,” said the President of the Republic.

The head of state brushed aside comparisons with his predecessors, which he considered inappropriate. “The place of a President of the Republic is not to go to a march. The last time a president went to a march was the day after an attack, with 2 million people and several dozen heads of state and government taking to the streets in France. Was this the case last Sunday? No,” he added before concluding: “My role is to continue to preserve the unity of the country during this period.”

Emmanuel Macron also judged that the absence of opponents at his meeting in Saint-Denis was a “major political fault”. After the Socialist Party and France Insoumise, the LR also refused to participate in the new “Saint-Denis meeting” organized this Friday by the President of the Republic. “The absence from a working meeting on constitutional reforms is absolutely unworthy” on their part, declared the French president. “No pretext justifies it and especially not using the current geopolitical context,” he added, referring to the conflict in the Middle East.