The State of Israel was quick to reject United Kingdom Prime Minsiter Keir Starmer’s announcement Tuesday that his government was prepared to recognize a Palestinian state at the United Nations General Assembly in September.
In a statement posted to X, the Israeli foreign ministry said:
Israel rejects the statement by the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.
The shift in the British government’s position at this time, following the French move and internal political pressures, constitutes a reward for Hamas and harms efforts to achieve a ceasefire in Gaza and a framework for the release of hostages.
Starmer, as Breitbart News reported, had been under pressure from left-wing factions within his Labour Party to recognize a Palestinian state, without any concessions from the Palestinians themselves, in the midst of a war started by Palestinians with the largest mass murder of Jews since the Holocaust.
The prime minister tried to qualify his recognition of a Palestinian state by saying that Hamas must release all of its remaining hostages, disarm, and accept that it could not play a role in any future government.
He did not explain what the boundaries of the Palestinian state would be; what form of government it would take, if not the current autocratic one (even under the Palestinian Authority); and whether it would be demilitarized.
Israel opposes the establishment of a Palestinians state — especially as the outcome of a war Hamas started and is losing. Israelis had supported a two-state solution to the conflict with Palestinians as recently as 2013, but terror and wars started by Hamas caused public opinion to shift decisively against a Palestinian state.
Starmer’s announcement came the day after his meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump in Scotland. Trump opposes the declaration of a Palestinian state, absent a negotiated agreement; it was not clear if the UK had informed the Trump administration beforehand of its decision to announce its change in position.
Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of Trump 2.0: The Most Dramatic ‘First 100 Days’ in Presidential History, available for Amazon Kindle. He is also the author of The Trumpian Virtues: The Lessons and Legacy of Donald Trump’s Presidency, now available on Audible. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.
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