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Questioning Unilateral Recognition of a Palestinian State
(BICOM-UK) British Prime Minister Keir Starmer has announced the intention to recognize a State of Palestine at the UN General Assembly in September. This study demonstrates how premature recognition undermines peace efforts. Recognition can pressure both Israelis and Palestinians into actions that make a peaceful settlement harder, not easier. Recognition will not create a Palestinian state nor advance the creation of one; rather, it will be the most significant diplomatic gain for the Palestinian cause in decades, universally understood as having been made possible by the Oct. 7 massacre. If the two-state solution is indeed the desired goal, then policies must encourage conditions that make this outcome more likely and discourage those that make it less likely. Recognition at this stage, or interventions which halt the war before Hamas is defeated, protect and strengthen Hamas and are therefore counterproductive. Recognition would take place in the context of already worsening UK-Israel relations and would further deteriorate ties between two countries that until recently considered themselves strategic partners.