French president Francois Hollande announced he will address the Knesset during his visit in Israel next week, two weeks after he decided not to speak to the Israeli parliament but to university students instead.
The decision to cancel his address was met with outrage in Jerusalem where Knesset Speaker, Yuli Edelstein, said Hollande was not welcome in the parliament. He also announced that the Knesset would boycott French delegates who would not be invited to formal functions until further notice.
"International leaders cannot belittle the Knesset, the elected parliament of the State of Israel, and ignore it,’’ Edelstein said at the time.
He welcomed the French president’s decision to finally address the plenum.
“This is a great honor for the Knesset to host the president of France, a country that is one of Israel’s greatest allies,” Edelstein said. “I am happy and proud that President Hollande decided to respect the Knesset and its members and speak to the Israeli people on the stage of the stronghold of Israeli democracy.”
Before giving his speech, President Hollande will meet with his Israeli counterpart Shimon Peres, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, Opposition leader Shelly Yacimovich and Edelstein in the Knesset’s Chagall Hall.
The Geneva talks between the world powers and Iran on its nuclear programme will be high on the agenda of the talks between Netanyahu and Hollande.
France’s ambassador to Israel, Patrick Maisonnave said that it is thanks to France that a deal was not signed over the weekend in Geneva that would have eased sanctions on Tehran in exchange for a promise to limit uranium enrichment.
Speaking to reporters ahead of Hollande’s visit, the ambassador said that it was due to France's demands for more verifiable guarantees that Iran would not attain nuclear weapons capability that the deal --- forcefully opposed by Israel--- fell through. After France expressed its doubts, the other Western powers did so as well, he said.
French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said that Paris was uncomfortable with the draft agreement that had been drawn up in the Geneva negotiations over the Iranian nuclear program. “There are some points on which we are not satisfied,” Fabius said, citing the "extremely prolific" Arak nuclear reactor and the question of uranium enrichment. He also expressed concerns over Iran's stockpile of 20 percent enriched uranium.
Maisonnave said that many Israeli officials had expressed their appreciation for France’s position.
During his three-day visit in Israel, President Hollande will attend a memorial ceremony for the victims of Mohammed Merah, a French Islamist radical who killed four people, including three children, in the Ozar Hatorah Jewish school in Toulouse in March 2012.
After Israel, Hollande will travel to Ramallah for meetings with the Palestinian Authority.