On Sunday, French performers from different religious and ethnic backgrounds initiated a silent march in Central Paris, France, calling for peace amid the Israel-Hamas war.
Thousands of people attended the silent march, including actors Isabelle Adjani and Emmanuelle Beart, as well as singers and other cultural figures, who marched from the Arab World Institute toward the Museum of Art and History of Judaism.
French Performers Initiate Silent March
The French performers were holding olive branches and white banners as they led thousands of people to march, calling for peace amid the Israel-Hamas war.
Nadia Fares, a French actress, said that they have a blue sky on top of their head today and in Israel, in Palestine, they have an ongoing war. She said people were not helping ease the situation by choosing sides or throwing hate on one side or another.
She said she "will balance, hopefully, the cacophony we have all over the world."
French President Emmanuel Macron spoke to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and with the leaders of Qatar and Egypt on Saturday.
Macron noted that he was rooting for Israel's right to defend itself. However, he said that there were too many losses of lives in Gaza, and he urged an immediate humanitarian ceasefire.
He also addressed concern about violence against Palestinian civilians in the West Bank, and he ordered the resume of diplomatic efforts toward a two-state solution.
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French Government Pushes Truce
France, home to Jewish and Muslim populations, has been demonstrating weeks of protests and tensions over the Israel-Hamas war.
The French government has been pushing for a truce to acquire humanitarian aid for Palestinian civilians in Gaza. The government has also been performing extended hostage negotiations to release the eight French hostages held by Hamas.
In the October 7 Hamas attack, another 40 French citizens were killed in southern Israel. While the Palestinian death toll in the Israel-Hamas war has reached 9,448.
On Saturday, thousands of pro-Palestinian and left-wing activists protested in Paris and Britain. The protesters have also called for a ceasefire, which was the latest of several such protests in major cities around the world since the Israel-Hamas war began.
Steve Strauss, a 73-year-old Baltimore resident, said, "They are trying to kill as many Palestinians as they can get away with." He said he would stand up and be a voice for the oppressed people.
The banners displayed on a sound-system truck at the Paris march through rain-dampened streets read, "Stop the massacre in Gaza."
In World War II, the survivors of Nazi atrocities marched together with the young Jewish activists outside the Paris Holocaust memorial. The activists protested about the rising antisemitic hate speech, graffiti, and abuse in relation to the war between Israel and Hamas.
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