the, the business dw news lie from berlin, french motors, turn out in force in the 2nd round of snap parliamentary elections. many paulding stations have just closed president emanuel, my cons centrist alliance is expected to move many seats to marine. the pens far right. national rally. she's hoping to win a majority in the national assembly so she can govern alone. also coming up the war and gaza enters its 10th month as diplomatic efforts suggest. a c spark may be possible for the death toll in the palestinian territory continues to climb, falling straight on a you and run school. israel claims with sheltering come off terrorist

the i, melissa chan. welcome frances voting and the 2nd and final round of snap problem entry elections. voters are casting ballots that could produce the country's 1st bar, right government. since world war 2, many polling stations have already closed while others will remain open for a few more hours. president emmanuel mclaren took a huge gamble on calling the elections has his ballot in paris. he could lose control of parliament to the far right national rally party, which has emerged as a dominant force in several opinion polls. the rise of the far right national reality has been the main talking point in this campaign. let's see how france got here and what's at stake for the nation and the rest of the world. to today's votes

started with a crushing defeat for president emmanuel and crawls renaissance party at the hands of the far right in european elections. to clarify the political situation, he dissolved parliament and called a snap legislative pole, a gamble that the country was not ready to vote in a far right government. a gamble that seemed increasingly risky after the far right national rally easily took the lead in the 1st round of voting last sunday. the question now is whether they'll win an outright majority in the run off enough to rule without forming a coalition. that possibility frightens many and inspired more than 200 centrist and left wing candidates to pull out of the 2nd round earlier this week. to avoid splitting the anti national rally vote. the mood in paris has been both anxious and angry. the 16, this is your decision by my call isn't thought through. it's immature,

he shot himself in a foot shot and the feet of all the french just put everyone into this impossible situation. i'm plunged everyone into a deep mess. were all on the same mess on it was don't, i'm got it. i'm supposed to now headboard, i think people are just really fed up and deeply frustrated. given that under president mccord's 2 terms, we've seen an explosion of the far right. even though one of the promises of the president in 20172022 was to set up a barrage against the far right. the call for snap elections was meant to help the governing centrist against the far right. but had the unintended side effect of revitalizing the french left was form the new coalition overcoming decades of bickering and disagreements. the left wing coalition called the new popular front, pulled behind the national riley in the 1st round, but still well ahead of maxwell's party. on the far right campaigns largely on an

anti immigration platform and on pocket book issues, pledging to lower energy taxes for instance. but if it comes to power, it's historic animosity to the european union. and it's a nato could have major international effects in france for the far right to arrive in power and such a major. this is the 2nd biggest economy within, within the european union. and this is one of the world's biggest ministry powers. it's greatly volt and ukraine is involved in africa. it's, uh, it is country that, that, that really, you know, projects itself will be on this board. no matter what happens macro and will still be president. his term runs until 2027. but in the event of a right wing victory for a hung parliament where no party or collision gets a majority, his powers will be diminished. and he'll be stuck with a new government for at least a year. the minimum before he can see a radically dissolve parliament and call new elections again. as we are joined now

by dw correspondent leaves at lee in paris lees up poles have now closed in most french regions in major cities. they will close a little bit later. what can you tell us already? well, let me so we will have to wait today to clock to get more of an idea or a 1st idea of the whole picture. but we've already received the results of about a dozen overseas departments and in these departments, at the last oldest center, a came 1st so the far right national from well known of them. we obviously we have to wait until 8 o'clock and many of the regions are still many of the so constrictions, the pulling districts also off in the air, is only about 80 out of 577 seats were just reaching out to the 1st round of a thing, i know it's really difficult to say without knowing more, but could the national rally when this absolute majority that everyone is talking

about while there's still a chance, you know, the polls have our polls on a national level. there are no such polls that, that go to each one of the voting districts and that's what you would have to do to really get an idea or give them that polls and problems. normally, you tend to be quite accurate. now what we've seen though, you know ahead of the 1st round of face and even shortly after the 1st round of facing these national problems, we're showing that there was a good chance for the far right nationalities to win an absolute majority in common . however, over the course of the past week that has been about 200 come, the days that we drew from the rates. because given, you know, the french system, the french power watching system is not. if you gather, get, suppose of at least 12.5 percent of registered voters and round one. you get 3 drawn to so that many districts where they are more than 2 candidates into hundreds

of these roughly. yeah, 300 districts at the that but on the right has with the phone to block the fall, right? so i'm coming to power to give the value to the chance between either choice between the power, right? natural valley and, and now the candidates. and that makes space so complicated apart from the fact that you've got so many different folding districts. and you have to look at each one time, so we don't really know yet. that is a chance that the far right might get an awesome majority. the latest polls low show that the party is likely to become the biggest party in parliament. but it's rather unlikely, according to these holes at, for the pots you to get an absolute majority. it could be robert hung, call them, and it looks like so. so explain what happens if it is a hung parliament. what, what does that actually mean? well, that would be unsafe, the territory for phones from the french constituents here. i'm not really good,

you know, coming up with coalitions that working together. it's not something really no, but usual, maybe in belgium, maybe in france, but not in, at maybe in germany or belgium. but not in france, so we don't really know that could be a government of tax cuts. that could also be a couple of government of episode coded national union. we've little bit different policies, you know, joining forces to try to work together. what we know is by the us, as opposed to other countries, it's the president to name a prime minister. and then to bring down the credit, the prime minister, the policy needs to face against that prime minister. that to give that prime and such a big move, a child sustain power. if there's this, got to pick to empowerment because all the different forces from different sides have to come together to vote. the primary to sit down, but we will see what will happen. what we know that is that president mccaul is likely to come out as a considerably reprint of this election, which he thought was a very good idea. but it seems like many people here don't really agree on. uh yeah

. what does this all mean for president mccord on? just to clarify, for people who aren't familiar with the system, he stays president regardless of what happens tonight. correct? yes, absolutely. you said in advance to the 2nd round this agent that he'd stay impala until the next presidential election in 2027. however, he also said before, you know, before the european elections, that he wouldn't to solve the parliament, which he then dates. so there is only so much trust here in phones when it comes to his words, it is what he said as to what you would do at now. for my clumsy as i said, this really means that he's quite returned when it comes to his position in power. he was hoping to get an absolute majority with this distillation of solomon. lighten space is very unlikely to walk out for him. now we're hearing that contains been marked by threats and even some physical violence. can you tell us a little bit more we've heard from the government that there were about 50 cases of

physical or verbal aggressions. and you know, during this week of campaign between a round one and around 2 and at hand from the very tens atmosphere. we've also heard reports. so if you know people are, you know, dressing others and you know, saying outright racist comments, people, you know, the number one topic here in front seems to be of these elections. and people are really watching what, what happens tonight. and what we also nice thought. it'd be, you know, it would be secret service to see and fonts are expecting that that might be some buttons at least some of demonstrations out in the streets. so that really watching the situation very closely. thank you very much. when he's out we, we of the now to bell mad let is a french journalist based here in berlin, and he joins me in the studio tonight as we get results in the 2nd round of french elections. welcome. now we're hearing that voter turn out is higher than during the

1st round. does this preference one political party over another? well, the opposite is fair. have to tell it until we have the results. but surely, people really understood that this isn't a historic moment for friends, some sort of a breakfast, which we're friends, a moment for funds and the most likely people from both sides. the nation or radi voters, cameron mass to support the party. and the other one's a trying to fight against national really came or so very much stronger than even last week, which was already very high. let's go back a little bit because a french president mclaughlin called the snap elections after the results of the european parliament that showed a significant progress in terms of far right parties. this was supposed to be strategic on the cons part. what was he thinking? what was the rationale? well, i'm the true, it's basically how to explain what do you look to anyone for you to understand what

he did. but, you know, officially what he said, he said he wanted some sort of clarification of to the european elections. and to see whether it can really have some sort of support into the national assembly or not. and also knowing that he had a it which was that we do a minority government since 2022. and, and i guess his bet was likely is i'll just say, maybe people would understand it with me if you have the ability and you have some soft or some sort of a reasonable government and was a nation of ronnie, you end up in kaos what you didn't really what it, what you underestimated with it is that the national runs, what i so we're going to send out a policy voters would stick to the votes, frank and or so what do you underestimated was that the left wing bodies would unite against him really and also the fact that people are,

well he's popularity is as is just very, very weak. now, laquanda has always been very pro e u pro europe. what would a national rally and, you know, party in charge, mean for europe, that officially they say they don't want to leave the opinion anymore. they don't want to leave the you either. so it's not a friendship. i mean, they don't denounce it like for x anymore, but what they say is that they would try to re negotiate things like the budget, things like this changing agreement and energy prices. they would also have a different take on metal, on the crane grain. so they've been quite vague really on what they really want to do and, and in a way to make it more acceptable for voters to vote for the i some of them on us or not. but it's main unknown. could you talk

a little bit more about what this could mean for ukraine? well, they officially support the crane, which wasn't really what people expected in the 1st place. but they are quite clear objectives where they, how far we can suppose we put in for those macro and said it would be ready to send troops on the ground that the national body side. they won't ever do that. so the clear lines between michael ends or some of the night, and they would probably support talks led by someone like virtual button or even putting. now liza talked earlier about a hung parliament as a possibility with france being the 2nd largest economy in the you. what could that potentially mean as well? if you listen to business leaders out that main bends of the main danger for them

is that part of the left wing part is the match, the, the, the business agenda in front. so that in a way some of them i'm more afraid of the it's called the and bold a full size for me is then of the hospital when i send not why is because the customer and i send out of has tried to normalize. it says, and i have no work on the in depth on the subject. um, but uh, what it would mean in a hand column in situation. it would be that the budget of last year would be just repeated. right. so it would be such a sco, ready, now, um do you think that uh, the results tonight would be a message from voters? i do think that some of the voting is a protest vote versus a genuine support for this for the far right party to. well its both really um, it used to be a move that protects both. now you can see it's also

a vote for potty and support of the nation.