Hassan says she lifted the Israeli flag in Strasbourg and that the EU flag fell

French MEP Rima Hassan told the European Parliament on Tuesday that she had taken an Israeli flag off its stand at an exhibition marking the 7 October 2023 attacks, and that a European Union flag on the same foot fell because the stand lost balance. She said neither flag was trampled, torn or thrown. Parliament president Roberta Metsola had said, before Tuesday's votes, that a member had been filmed on Monday evening apparently damaging the exhibition. Vice-president Pina Picierno accused Hassan of trampling the flags. Hassan called Metsola's account factually false.

Hassan sits with France Unbowed and the Parliament's Left group. She said the exhibition had been organised with the Israeli embassy, and she compared the presence of an Israeli flag in the building to a Russian flag, which she said would not be accepted while Moscow is at war in Ukraine. In a statement and on X she wrote that her gesture was a protest at what she called an ongoing genocide, at breaches of international law, and at a double standard. She said she had written to Metsola with her version. She told the chamber she did not touch the European flag.

The exhibition was mounted ahead of the third anniversary of the Hamas-led attacks, in which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 were taken hostage. United Nations secretary-general António Guterres, in a message dated 6 October, called those attacks an abhorrent large-scale terror attack, noted the abuse of hostages in captivity, and said last year's ceasefire had not yet delivered security, adequate aid, or a credible path to recovery. He urged the parties to carry out their commitments and move to the next phase of the plan endorsed by the Security Council. The Strasbourg display and the secretary-general's text are separate acts on the same anniversary. They are not the same dispute.

Parliament rules allow sanctions for a serious breach, running from a reprimand to the loss of daily allowances or a temporary suspension from some parliamentary work. Metsola said the incident was being taken seriously. No sanction had been announced by Tuesday night. The factual fight is over a short piece of video: whether Hassan only lifted one flag, whether the EU flag fell from imbalance, and whether either flag was damaged. Hassan says no damage and no trampling. Picierno says trampling. The video, if the Parliament publishes it, ends that part of the argument. Motive does not.

The embassy link is the part Hassan is using as justification and the part Metsola's critics will treat as ordinary diplomatic practice. National days and anniversary displays in the Parliament regularly involve the mission of the country concerned. Hassan's comparison with a Russian flag draws a line the Parliament has not drawn in its own rules. Russia is under a set of EU sanctions and a political boycott that Israel is not. A member can object to a display. Removing a flag from it is a physical act, and it is the act that triggers the rule book, not the speech that follows.

The timing, the day before the anniversary, is why the row moved as fast as it did. Families of people killed on 7 October 2023, and families of hostages, have used this week of sittings in Strasbourg as a public date. A flag taken off a stand in that week becomes a diplomatic incident inside a parliamentary one. Hassan's letter to Metsola asks the president to correct the record on damage. Metsola's opening line asked the house to treat the filming as a breach. Those are two procedures. One is a point of fact. The other is a disciplinary file.

What has not been published is the footage Metsola referred to, the text of Hassan's letter, or a decision on sanctions. Until the video is shown, the verified record is the president's allegation, the vice-president's accusation, and Hassan's admission that she removed the Israeli flag and her denial that she damaged either flag.