The Tonnerre in 2018 (Official US Navy site / Flickr)
It is called Tonnerre and is equipped with a small hospital, but it is also one of the most important attack ships in the French Navy
While in Cairo, Egypt, on October 25, French President Emmanuel Macron said that France had sent a naval ship from the Gaza Strip to “support Palestinian hospitals” struggling due to lack of fuel, water and medical supplies. to maintain their operations. The ship in question is not exactly a “hospital ship”: it is the Tonnerre, one of the most important and largest attack ships in the French Navy.
The decision came after Macron’s visit to Israel, the West Bank and Jordan this week and can be read as the French president’s response to those who have accused him in recent weeks of pursuing too pro-Israel policies.
However, the deployment of such an important ship was seen by many, including Le Monde, the main French newspaper, as a direct intervention by France in the conflict between Israel and Hamas, with consequences that are still unclear: the ship is equipped with sophisticated communications equipment – and listening devices that could provide French intelligence with valuable information. If the situation in the region deteriorates further, it could also be used to evacuate the many French citizens living in the region, particularly from Lebanon.
The Tonnerre, which means “thunder” in Italian, is an amphibious helicopter carrier of the Mistral class, the type that served in the Normandy landings). A recent article from the news site Politico describes it as a “floating village”: It is 32 meters wide and 199 meters long (almost the length of two football fields) and can transport over 21,000 tons. There is space on board for 16 helicopters, 60 armored vehicles, 13 tanks, small boats for docking and evacuation, various types of weapons such as machine guns and small rockets, and up to 900 soldiers.
The ship also houses a medical facility with two operating rooms and 69 beds, equivalent to a hospital for a city of 25,000, designed to carry out surgical procedures as close to a combat zone as possible. Given the current humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip, the French contribution will be little more than symbolic (al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, the largest hospital in the Strip, has 1,500 beds), but its arrival will certainly be useful to ease pressure on Palestinian medical staff. In his announcement on Wednesday, Macron added that France was sending a plane with medical equipment and supplies to Egypt to transport them to the Gaza Strip.
In addition to the approximately 200 people that normally make up the crew, the Tonnerre left Toulon with an army combat unit on board with all its equipment, which also includes armored vehicles and logistics trucks.
Mistral-class attack ships, such as the Tonnerre, were built in the early 2000s and have been used in several French and NATO operations, such as the French military operation in Mali in 2013, but also in the evacuation of French and European citizens from the Middle East East during the 2006 conflict between Israel and Hezbollah. The Tonnerre was deployed in Lebanon in 2020 after a large explosion destroyed the port of Beirut and France supplied the country with food and building materials.
The ship is expected to reach the waters of the island of Cyprus, which lies northwest of the coasts of Israel and Palestine, in three to four days. There it will join two other smaller French ships already in the area: the Surcouf, a Lafayette-class frigate carrying about 150 French naval personnel and a helicopter, and the Alsace, a multi-role frigate carrying 130 people. Surcouf was already in the area as part of France’s permanent intelligence and surveillance mission as part of the international operation against the Islamic State (ISIS). The Alsace, on the other hand, achieved it a few days ago: it is one of the most modern ships in the French Navy and is specialized in anti-aircraft defense, as it is equipped with short and medium-range missiles capable of protecting against air strikes and certain types of attacks missiles and drones.
– Also read: Israel still doesn’t know what to do with the invasion of Gaza
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