Leila Shahid, Palestinian diplomat, dies in France aged 76

Leila Shahid, the first female diplomat to represent Palestine abroad, has died at age 76, drawing an outpouring of condolences and tributes.

Citing Shahid’s family, Le Monde newspaper said the former Palestinian ambassador to France died on Wednesday at her home in the south of the country.

“She died today,” her sister Zeina told the AFP news agency, without providing further details.

“Leila Shahid, the iconic ambassador of Palestine, has left us,” Hala Abou-Hassira, the Palestinian ambassador to France, wrote on social media. “A tremendous loss for Palestine and for the world that believes in justice.”

Majed Bamya, the deputy Palestinian envoy to the United Nations, also paid tribute to Shahid, describing her as “a voice for justice, freedom and peace”.

“She is Palestine personified in the francophone world. She’s the one who convinced me to join the diplomatic corps, or as she put it, to have the honour of representing a cause and a people,” Bamya wrote on X.

“I had the honour of serving alongside her, of learning alongside her, of witnessing her magnanimity and compassion, and seeing how she embodies the aspirations and suffering of her people.”

Hussam Zumlot, the Palestinian ambassador to the United Kingdom, also hailed Shahid as “a towering figure, a role model and one of the most inspiring diplomats Palestine has ever known”.

“Palestine has lost a seasoned and steadfast voice — one who carried her people’s cause with grace, conviction, and unwavering dedication,” he wrote on X.

‘Her fight is our fight’

Born in the Lebanese capital Beirut in 1949, Shahid studied at the American University of Beirut, where she met Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat.

She worked in Palestinian refugee camps in Lebanon before becoming the first woman to represent the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) abroad, beginning her career in Ireland in 1989, before also becoming a representative in the Netherlands and Denmark.

She served as Palestinian ambassador to France for more than a decade, from 1994 until 2005, and later as the envoy to the European Union, Belgium and Luxembourg.

In an interview with France24 in September of last year, Shahid hailed France’s decision to formally recognise a Palestinian state.

“I think it’s very, it’s very important, it’s not only symbolic,” she said. “We are reminding the world that it’s [about] self-determination, and we don’t know any other form for self-determination except a state.”

But she added that a lot of work still needed to be done “to change the reality” for Palestinians.

“We know that on the ground, we are witnessing a genocide in Gaza and very, very violent, brutal attacks by the settlers in the West Bank,” she told France24. “We have been occupied since 1967, and you can’t make a state under military Israeli rule.”

On Wednesday, Abou-Hassira – the Palestinian ambassador to France – said in a statement that Shahid never stopped speaking out against the Israeli occupation or believing that “justice would ultimately prevail”.

Her death comes “as Palestine is experiencing one of the darkest chapters in its history”, Abou-Hassira said.

“In her memory, we commit to continuing what she started. Her fight is our fight. Her determination is our compass. Her demand for dignity, justice, and truth remains our roadmap.”