I'm not disbelieving you about the French Foreign Minister, and maybe I'm just mixing up titles, but I thought I read that the French Foreign Minister expressed great solidarity with the Israeli people.
It was one of the French ministers because I read his statement (in shock) aloud to my husband.
I did read about the Israelis holding up a ship for security concerns; I think it had to do with dual citizenship issues.
I named the wrong French minister: French Prime Minister/Premier de Villepin was the one who went to Beirut. From the
WSJ timeline, July 17:
11:15 a.m.: French Premier Dominique de Villepin arrived in Beirut on a mission to express solidarity with a country under siege and bombardment by Israel. Villepin is the highest-level foreign official to visit the country since the crisis began last week. France said his visit was aimed only at showing support, but it comes as the U.N. and European Union are launching diplomatic efforts to end the crisis. I did read about the Israelis holding up a ship for security concerns; I think it had to do with dual citizenship issues.
The Israelis boarded the ship before it docked in Beirut because it was vetting the Lebanese heading home. From the
current AP article about the ship landing in Cyprus:
The Orient Queen arrived in Beirut on Tuesday night. It was held up en route by Israeli ships because it had Lebanese on board, who had been taking a cruise in the eastern Mediterranean when the fighting began.
The State Department is now claiming that the evacuation was being held up in part for safety reasons. They probably wanted assurances from Israel that they wouldn't shoot, and to get the USS Gonzales into position just in case Hezbollah decided to do something stupid. They might have been willing to try an evacuation without the Gonzales in place if Hezbollah didn't shoot a missile at an Israeli warship. Getting your ducks in a row take time - especially when you're evacuating people in the middle of a war zone on the other side of the world.