French President Emmanuel Macron announced on Thursday that France will formally recognize a Palestinian state this September during the United Nations General Assembly.

In a post on X, Macron framed the move as part of a broader effort to fulfill France’s commitment to “a just and lasting peace in the Middle East.”

The announcement comes just hours after talks for a ceasefire and hostage deal fell through due to Hamas not acting “in good faith,” according to Special Envoy for Peace Missions Steve Witkoff.

“We will now consider alternative options to bring the hostages home and try to create a more stable environment for the people of Gaza,” Witkoff wrote. “It is a shame that Hamas has acted in this selfish way.”

Macron outlined five key priorities: ending the war in Gaza, securing the release of hostages, delivering humanitarian aid to Gazans, demilitarizing Hamas, and rebuilding the Gaza Strip.

Macron wrote that it is “essential to build the State of Palestine, ensure its viability, and enable it, by accepting its demilitarization and fully recognizing Israel, to contribute to the security of all in the Middle East.”

“There is no alternative,” he added.

Macron said his decision followed commitments made to him by Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas. Abbas is currently in his 20th year of what was originally a four-year term.

France is the most influential European country to recognize a Palestinian state, joining more than a dozen others — including Spain, Norway, Ireland, and Sweden. All told, over 140 countries have recognized a Palestinian state.

Israel has strongly opposed the establishment of a Palestinian state in Judea and Samaria, also known as the West Bank and Gaza, and says doing so now would reward the terrorists who murdered over 1,000 Israelis on October 7, 2023.

“Macron’s recognition of a Palestinian state after the October 7th massacre isn’t diplomacy; it’s moral collapse,” Former Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett posted to X in response. “It rewards mass murder and tells Islamist terrorists: kill Jews, and the world will hand you a state. This shameful decision will be tossed into the dustbin of history.”

There has never been a Palestinian state. Prior to Israeli occupation, Judea and Samaria were occupied by Jordan, and Gaza by Egypt.

Israeli Minister of Finance Betzalel Smotrich said France’s announcement provides a “compelling reason” to apply Israeli sovereignty over Judea and Samaria.

“I thank President Macron for providing yet another compelling reason to finally apply Israeli sovereignty over the historic regions of Judea and Samaria, and to definitively abandon the failed concept of establishing a Palestinian terrorist state in the heart of the Land of Israel,” he wrote. “This will be our fitting Zionist response to the one-sided pressure and coercive measures led by President Macron and his allies.”

On Wednesday, Israel’s Knesset voted in favor of a declaratory resolution in support of applying Israeli sovereignty to Judea, Samaria, and the Jordan Valley in a vote of 71-13.

“The Knesset affirms that the State of Israel has a natural, historical, and legal right to the entirety of the Land of Israel – the ancestral homeland of the Jewish people,” the resolution reads. “The Knesset calls upon the cabinet of Israel to act promptly to extend Israeli sovereignty, including law, jurisdiction, and administration, over all areas of Jewish communities, in all its forms, in Judea, Samaria, and the Jordan Valley.

More than 500,000 Israelis live in Judea and Samaria.

Legendary singer Billy Joel said he always looked forward to being a father, in large part because his father left the family after divorcing his mother when he was just eight years old.

“It means a lot to me, and I think that’s maybe part of the father thing,” Joel told People during an interview published on Thursday. “I didn’t have a dad, so it was very important for me to be a dad.”

The 76-year-old “Piano Man” singer is a father of three, including daughter Alexa Ray, 39, whom he shares with his ex-wife, former model Christie Brinkley. Joel remarried for the fourth time in 2015 and had two more girls: Della, 9, and Remy, 7.

“I love all of my girls. And poetic justice, I had all girls, of course, but I’m really enjoying this a lot,” he told the outlet. “It’s something I was looking forward to all my life, and here I am.”

While Joel believed he was “too old” to have more children after marrying equestrian Alexis Roderick, he went on to have his youngest daughters at the ages of 66 and 68. 

“Having these little kids at this time in my life is such a joy,” Joel said in a documentary about his life, as the outlet noted. “I have time to be with them … I wanted to make sure that they got everything they needed from me, so I kind of knuckled down and took fatherhood very, very seriously.”

It’s a topic he’s visited before. In 2023, the “Uptown Girl” singer said he revels in being there for his kids.

“I wait around for the kids to come back from school. I love hanging out with my children,” he told the Los Angeles Times. “They’re so much fun and so interesting to me. I get to be a stay-at-home dad. That’s how I enjoy my life these days.”

Joel, who was recently diagnosed with a brain condition affecting his balance and vision, is currently promoting his new HBO documentary series “Billy Joel: And So It Goes,” which includes details about his father leaving the family. The six-time Grammy Award winner said he tracked down his dad when he was in his early 20s and found him living in Vienna with a new family.

The singer told People he wished his dad were proud of him, but said they “never really made a strong connection … It’s disappointing.”

Joel’s father passed away in 2011.