The Palestinian flag flies beside the flag of the United Nations after being raised by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in a ceremony during the United Nations General Assembly at the United Nations in Manhattan, New York. Reuters
"We welcome the statements made by French President Emmanuel Macron regarding his country's readiness to recognise the State of Palestine," Hamas official Mahmud Mardawi told AFP.
He called the announcement "an important step that, if implemented, would constitute a positive shift in the international position towards the legitimate national rights of our Palestinian people".
On Wednesday, Macron said France plans to recognise a Palestinian state within months and could make the move at a UN conference in New York in June.
"We must move towards recognition, and we will do so in the coming months," Macron, who this week visited Egypt, told France 5 television.
Mardawi said France's move was important because it is a veto-wielding permanent member of the UN Security Council.
"France, as a country with political weight and a permanent member of the (UN) Security Council, has the ability to influence the course of fair solutions and push towards ending the occupation and achieving the aspirations of the Palestinian people," Mardawi said.
He said those aspirations were "freedom, independence and the establishment of their state on their land, with Jerusalem as its capital".
Gaza City resident Ibrahim Musa told AFP he "felt very relieved" when he heard the news.
"We are a suffering people and we are still suffering, and we hope that the Western world will take positive steps to stop this war with all the strength it can," he said.
But for fellow Gaza City resident Salwa Al-Shandaghli, "this pressure is not enough".
"We need other countries and stronger backing... in order to exert greater pressure on the Israeli occupation," she said.
Palestinian minister of state for foreign affairs Varsen Aghabekian Shahin, who is based in the West Bank city of Ramallah, told AFP France's recognition of Palestinian statehood "would be a step in the right direction in line with safeguarding the rights of the Palestinian people and the two-state solution".
Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar denounced Macron's announcement as a "prize for terror and a boost for Hamas".
"These kind of actions will not bring peace, security and stability in our region closer -- but the opposite: they only push them further away," he said on X late on Wednesday.
Nearly 150 countries recognise a Palestinian state.
In May 2024, Ireland, Norway and Spain announced recognition, followed by Slovenia in June.
Their moves were partly fuelled by anger at the high civilian death toll in Israel's devastating war on Gaza that killed and wounded more than 160,000 Palestinians and reduced the strip to rubble.
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