Nicolas Sarkozy ends his hyperactive stint as President of Europe at midnight but he made clear today that he aims to stay on as the continent’s de facto leader.

The French President’s plans to visit Israel next week to broker a ceasefire in the Gaza strip confirmed that he has no intention of taking a back seat after what he sees as the most dynamic turn by any leader in the Union’s rotating chair.

To underline Mr Sarkozy’s European glory, television viewers were to be treated tonight to a lingering shot of the Eiffel Tower, lit in the blue and gold of Europe, before the President delivered his traditional new year message.

In Mr Sarkozy’s view, the leadership of Europe cannot be left to the next incumbent, the Czech Republic, a small, recent member state with a Eurosceptic Government. It needs a powerful figure from a founder state to steer the Union through dangerous times, he has told aides. “Of course I will be taking initiatives,” he told the European Parliament after a triumphant review of six months during which he managed financial turmoil and war in the Caucasus.

Bernard Kouchner, the Foreign Minister, said that Mr Sarkozy aimed to visit Israel when he visits French trooops in southern Lebanon next Tuesday.

Israeli public radio said that Mr Sarkozy would come to Jerusalem on Monday.

In its last official act in the EU seat, France summoned EU Foreign Ministers to Paris to seek support for a call for a 48-hour ceasefire in Israel’s Gaza offensive.

Mr Sarkozy is to meet Tzipi Livni, the Israeli Foreign Minister, in Paris tomorrow. His wants to put his international stature to use in the Gaza war in the way that he brokered a halt to Russia’s invasion of Georgia on a trip to Moscow last August, aides said.

Mr Sarkozy is convinced that Europe still needs the energy which he deployed to give the continent muscle on the world stage as the United States stayed on the sidelines in recent months.

To bolster his claim to senior statesmanship, the President has invited Tony Blair to chair a two-day conference from next Thursday on “A new world, new capitalism”. Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany, with whom Mr Sarkozy has frosty relations, has agreed to attend the opening speeches.

“Super Sarko” is reported to be telling colleagues that he is worried that France will feel small after he has been commander of Europe. “He has one fear - becoming again the President of an average country, disarmed in the face of recession and confronted by soaring unemployment,” said Le Monde newspaper.

Mr Sarkozy was reported to be persisting in a plan - rejected by Germany - to appoint himself leader of a new governing council of the single currency states for 2009. The justification is that the Union is chaired by two non-euro nations this year - the Czechs and Sweden.

According to le Canard Enchaîné, an investigative weekly, Mr Sarkozy has persuaded Jose Luis Zapatero, the Spanish Prime Minister, to co-chair the group with him. Spain takes the EU presidency in January 2010. Mr Sarkozy argues that the euro needs an “economic government” at a time of upheaval and that the existing “euro-group” of finance ministers does not have the power for the job.

Mr Sarkozy is banking on the support of Gordon Brown, with whom he has good relations. The pair share a common scorn for the European Commission, which Mr Sarkozy believes he has cut down to size by asserting the power of the council of national leaders.

France will have an advantage this year because because Germany will be focused on elections and Britain will be mired in a more painful recession than the countries of the eurozone, the Elysée Palace believes.

Mr Sarkozy’s tour of European duty has earned him praise from political foes, but not all. Jean-Marie Le Pen, leader of the far right National Front, dismissed his EU presidency as a flashy show. “Sic transit gloria mundi (thus passes the glory of the world),” Mr Le Pen sniped in Latin. “The half-year of Mr Sarkozy will be forgotten in two weeks time,” he said.

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