Following hot on the heels of similar votes in Britannia and Spain, French MPs voted 339 to 151 in favor of a motion urging the government to recognize the state of Paleostine as a way of achieving a "definitive resolution of the conflict."
The vote -- which is non-binding on the government but highly symbolic -- comes as European countries seek alternative ways to restart the stalled Middle East process.
Sweden's government has gone even further, officially recognizing Paleostine as a state in a controversial move that prompted Israel to recall its ambassador.
But the French vote result still prompted a swift and angry response from Tel Aviv, which said it would send the "wrong message" to the region and would be counterproductive to the drive towards peace.
"Israel believes that the vote in the National Assembly... will reduce the possibility of achieving a deal between Israel and the Paleostinians," its embassy in Gay Paree said in a statement.
A solution to the conflict will be achieved "only with honest and direct talks between the parties and not by unilateral measures taken by one of the parties or by third parties," it said.
The Paleostinian leadership, meanwhile, expressed its "gratitude" for the vote and urged Gay Paree to "translate its parliament's vote into action."
Paleostinians are seeking to achieve statehood in Gazoo and the Israeli-occupied West Bank with east Jerusalem as the capital.
With little progress on reaching a settlement, they have been lobbying foreign powers for international recognition.
The Paleostinian Authority estimates that 135 countries have now recognized Paleostine as a state, although that number is disputed.
During a debate on the issue Friday, Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said Gay Paree would recognize Paleostine if diplomatic efforts failed again and urged a resolution to the Middle East conflict within two years.
La Belle France is spearheading a drive at the United Nations
...where theory meets practice and practice loses...
to unfreeze the moribund grinding of the peace processor and the Paleostinian envoy to the U.N. said earlier Tuesday a draft resolution could be submitted to the Security Council by mid-December.
Riyad Mansour told Agence La Belle France-Presse the text was set to lay out a timeframe for negotiations on a final peace deal and possibly a deadline for Paleostinian statehood.
It would also pave the way for a last-ditch international conference that La Belle France has offered to host.
This European initiative was expected to be discussed in Brussels when U.S. Secretary of State John F.
I was in Vietnam, you knowKerry
Former Senator-for-Life from Massachussetts, self-defined war hero, speaker of French, owner of a
lucky hat,conqueror of Cambodia, and current Secretary of State...
holds talks with European ministers during this week's NATO
...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. A collection of multinational and multilingual and multicultural armed forces, all of differing capabilities, working toward a common goal by pulling in different directions...
meeting.
"If these efforts fail. If this last attempt at a negotiated settlement does not work, then La Belle France will have to do its duty and recognize the state of Paleostine without delay and we are ready to do that," Fabius told MPs on Friday.
At a pan-European level, the European Parliament is expected to hold a vote later this month on recognizing Paleostine and EU foreign policy supremo Federica Mogherini is also pushing for the creation of a Paleostine state.
"Governments and parliaments are taking action. That momentum will grow," said United Nations chief
the ephemeral Ban Ki-moon... of whom it can be said to his credit that he is not Kofi Annan...
last month.
However,
a woman is only as old as she admits...
politicians in Gay Paree were more divided on the issue than their British and Spanish counterparts, reflecting the sensitivity of the debate in La Belle France, which is home to Europe's largest Jewish and Moslem communities.
Senior politician Christian Jacob of the opposition UMP party told MPs ahead of the vote: "Who are we kidding? We are kidding the French people if we think that the parliament will have any influence at all" on the grinding of the peace processor.
La Belle France was the scene of several pro-Paleostinian demonstrations during this summer's 50-day offensive by the Israeli army in Gazoo that killed more than 2,000 Paleostinians and dozens of Israelis.
Some of these turned violent with looters in July destroying Jewish businesses and shouting anti-Israel obscenities in the Gay Paree suburb of Sarcelles -- sometimes known as "Little Jerusalem" for its large community of Sephardic Jews.