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Samantha de Bendern during her controversial intervention on set on LCI, Thursday November 7.
MEDIA – Mea culpa. Caught up by her comments after the arrest of two French gendarmes in Israel, researcher and columnist on LCI Samantha de Bendern returned this Friday, November 8, to the words she had used the day before to try to explain the situation.
Put into context. During Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot’s trip to Jerusalem, a diplomatic incident took place when Israeli police entered an area belonging to France, before arresting two French gendarmes.
The scene, filmed during the entry into the L’Eléona site, then provoked the anger of the French minister, who denounced a “unacceptable situation” and had therefore refused to enter this place of pilgrimage, believing that the Israeli police had entered “armed” et “without permission” on this religious site.
On set on the LCI channel after the events, Samantha de Bendern declared: “Just one question.” We don’t see the faces of the gendarmes, but one thing that could perhaps excuse the behavior of the Israelis would be if the gendarmes looked like they were… maybe of North African origin or looked like they were Arabs. »
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Comments which immediately caused discomfort on set, with several people speaking out to refute or qualify this position. Faced with the scale of the reactions, the researcher explained the basis of her thoughts in a tweet.
“My words were clumsy”
She thus asserts that her remarks “ which seemed to excuse the actions of the Israeli police officers towards the French gendarmes aimed to explain this behavior and in no way to justify it ».
« If these unfortunately spoken words offended anyone, I am deeply sorry and I offer them my sincere apologies. “, she wanted to add. She also took the liberty of responding to certain Internet users by explaining that her “ remarks were certainly clumsy but in no way reflect » the person she is.
The researcher associated with Chatham House (a think tank specializing in international subjects) was in fact accused of “ uninhibited racism » or « ordinary racism » on social networks. But also by several LFI deputies, including the rebellious leader Mathilde Panot.
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If this incident now seems to be closed, the diplomatic one should have consequences since the Israeli ambassador in Paris will be summoned “in the coming days” to discuss this incident, announced the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs. In its defense, Israeli diplomacy has already assured that security issues had been “clarified” in advance with the French Embassy in Tel Aviv.
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