Opinion

Palestine recognition will not stop Israel's war on Gaza

While many leading Western powers have finally decided to recognise Palestinian statehood, it is unlikely to make any material difference on the ground for Palestinians

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Con Coughlin
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Palestine recognition will not stop Israel's war on Gaza

Con Coughlin
last update on

With Israel showing no sign of ending its military onslaught in Gaza, a plan by several Western governments to formally recognise Palestine as a state at the upcoming UN General Assembly is designed to provide the Palestinian people with reassurance that their cause has not been forgotten.

But the planned recognition will almost certainly fail to persuade the hawkish administration of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to end its war on Gaza—an onslaught recently termed by the United Nations as a genocide.

UK Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer is among several leaders from G7 countries who have announced their intention to recognise Palestine at next week’s annual gathering of UN leaders in New York. He first announced his intention to recognise a Palestinian state in July after coming under pressure from Labour ministers to take a harder line on Israel’s military campaign in Gaza.

Starmer said the UK would formally recognise a Palestinian state unless Israel took "substantive steps to end the appalling situation in Gaza". He also insisted that Israel needed to meet other conditions, such as agreeing to a ceasefire, committing to a long-term sustainable peace that delivers a two-state solution, and allowing the United Nations to restart the supply of aid.

But the move ostensibly aimed at getting Netanyahu to cooperate did not work. Instead, the Israeli prime minister asserted that recognition of a Palestinian state "rewards Hamas's monstrous terrorism" and has since escalated military operations in Gaza by greenlighting a ground invasion in Gaza City.

The UK leader’s decision to press ahead with recognition comes at a delicate time in US-UK relations, with US President Donald Trump being hosted for his second state visit to the UK in a bid to improve ties between the two countries. But London's growing criticism of Tel Aviv has not gone unnoticed in Washington. Yvette Cooper, the UK’s recently-appointed foreign secretary, denounced Israel’s latest military assault on Gaza City as “utterly reckless and appalling”.

“It will only bring more bloodshed, kill more innocent civilians and endanger the remaining hostages,” she added.

Several Western countries have finally decided to recognise Palestine, including France, the UK, Canada, Australia, Luxembourg and Malta

Unrelenting US support

Her comments were in stark contrast to the approach taken by US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who has just wrapped up a visit to Israel, where he prayed at the Wailing Wall in occupied East Jerusalem with Netanyahu and helped inaugurate a contentious archaeological tourism site—a tunnel excavated under Palestinian homes next to Jerusalem's Old City—led by an Israeli settler group.

Speaking in London, where Rubio joined Trump for a state banquet hosted by King Charles at Windsor Castle, the US envoy said that the US continued to support Israel, and warned that formally recognising Palestine as a state would make peace less likely.

"It actually makes it harder to negotiate," he said, "because it emboldens these groups (Hamas)." He added that there would be an Israeli "counter-reaction to those moves"—comments that were seen as a reference to Israel attempting to annex occupied areas of the West Bank.

Despite the Trump administration's reservations about recognising Palestine, several Western countries are finally planning to do so, including Canada, Australia, Luxembourg, Malta and France—the latter being the first to announce its intention of recognising a Palestinian state.

Read more: Why France may finally recognise Palestine

Announcing his decision in July in a post on X, Macron wrote, "The urgent need today is for the war in Gaza to end and for the civilian population to be rescued. Peace is possible. We need an immediate ceasefire, the release of all hostages, and massive humanitarian aid to the people of Gaza."

During his first term, Trump steered clear of the Palestine issue, instead focusing his efforts on persuading Arab governments to normalise relations with Israel

Anger and ambivalence

At the time, his announcement elicited an angry response from Trump, who accused Macron of  "publicity seeking", adding in a post on his social media platform, Truth Social,  that "whether purposely or not, Emmanuel always gets it wrong."

With the Trump administration unlikely to change its opposition to the principle of recognising a Palestinian state at the present time, the question remains whether the move by so many leading powers to declare their support for Palestine will make any material difference on the ground.

During his first term, Trump steered clear of the Palestine issue, instead focusing his efforts on persuading Arab governments to normalise relations with Israel through the Abraham Accords. He succeeded in bringing the UAE and Bahrain on board first, followed by Morocco and Sudan.

Trump's ambivalence on the Palestine issue was also clearly evident when he was directly asked about the viability of a two-state solution after meeting with Netanyahu in the summer, to which he replied: "I don't know". For its part, Israel last year passed a resolution that overwhelmingly rejected the establishment of a Palestinian state.

In recent days, thousands of Palestinians have been forced to flee Gaza City as the Israeli military has intensified its efforts to occupy the area, which it claims is Hamas's last remaining stronghold in Gaza, and where the remaining Israeli hostages are most likely being held.

So while a number of Western leaders are set to recognise Palestine at the UN, their actions are unlikely to have any direct impact on Israel's military offensive in Gaza.

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Related topics Gaza war palestine palestinian state The United Nations
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