A French air traffic controller at Paris’s Charles de Gaulle Airport has been suspended after making a “Free Palestine” remark to El Al pilots, French Transport Minister Philippe Tabarrot confirmed on Tuesday.
The exchange took place on Monday and was promptly reported by the pilots to their airline’s management.
In a statement, El Al said: “The company views with utmost seriousness the incident that occurred last night, in which a French air traffic controller addressed the pilot in an unprofessional and inappropriate manner. We are handling the matter with the authorities in Israel, who are in contact with the authorities in France.”
The episode comes against a backdrop of growing anti-Israel sentiment in France, both in public demonstrations and among political figures.
On Monday, Ynet revealed that French authorities have quietly stopped renewing work visas for El Al’s flight security staff stationed in Paris through the Israeli embassy. The policy shift, which reportedly began around six months ago, has already left several employees without legal documentation, with some forced to depart France entirely.
Just last week, vandals defaced El Al’s Paris offices with antisemitic graffiti, including the words “Genocide Airline,” and splattered red paint across the building’s exterior. Following the attack, the airline announced it would no longer keep staff in Paris, instead shifting passenger services to other carriers operating from the city.
Meanwhile, French President Emmanuel Macron has maintained a strongly critical stance toward Israel and its military campaign in Gaza.
He has twice urged an arms embargo on Israel to halt the conflict with Hamas and Hezbollah, stating that “stopping the export of weapons” used by Israel in Gaza and Lebanon was the only way to bring the fighting to an end.
The president’s position reached a new peak last month when he declared that France would formally recognize “the State of Palestine.”
{Matzav.com}
Why just suspended? He should be fired! A slap on the wrist is nothing
Anti-Semites cannot be trusted and should not be employed by El Al.
France will soon become a Caliphate. Woke politicians and leftists will be beheaded, and this accursed nation of Jew hating catholics who collaborated with the nazis and who have ALWAYS supported muslims and terrorists, offering succor to the arch terrorist ARAFAT, will reserve its just desserts. Not to mention the degenerate Macron, suspected of drug abuse and who married a woman, who maybe a man, old enough to be his mother.