Foreign Minister Penny Wong spoke of it as a piece of unfinished business. Australia recognised Israel when it declared statehood in 1948, pursuant to the UN’s partition plan endorsed by a majority of states, including, crucially, rival superpowers, the Soviet Union and the United States. It is high time to finish the work the UN started and acknowledge a Palestinian state alongside the Jewish one.
Only there’s a hitch. The reason why Palestine wasn’t created in 1948 wasn’t because of opposition to it. It wasn’t because of settler violence or Benjamin Netanyahu’s hard line or a crisis in Gaza.
It was because the Palestinians rejected it because accepting it would mean permanently entrenching a Jewish state in the Middle East.
Instead, they wagered on civil war buttressed by the Arab world, which dutifully invaded the Jewish state.
Israel wasn’t recognised by the world as a gift bestowed upon the Jewish people.
It was recognised because it had attained statehood by virtue of carefully building the components of a viable, democratic state – a free press, a multi-party political system, a vibrant civil society, organised labour, industry and free markets.
The world merely recognised a reality that had come to pass.
This is what has allowed it to sustain and thrive through incomparable adversity.
Have the Palestinians built the essential components of a viable state capable of withstanding jihadist forces, Iran and the competing tribes and factions that will be salivating at the prospect of claiming Palestine as a staging ground for the final destruction of Israel?
Australia is now committed to recognising as a state something with no agreed borders, no single government in effective control of its territory, and no capacity to live in peace with its neighbours.
In doing so, Australia has abandoned decades of bipartisan consensus which has envisaged Palestinian statehood and recognition as part of a comprehensive peace agreement between Israel, the Palestinians and the Arab states.
The Prime Minister spoke compellingly of the evils of Hamas, its crimes against Israelis and its own people, and the fact that its days of governing are over. All well and good.
But who will now finish the mission of rooting out Hamas in Gaza or stopping it from dominating in the West Bank? The Palestinian Authority? International peacekeepers? Only Israel has shown the willingness and ability to confront Hamas.
The commitments made by the Palestinian Authority to live in peace, demilitarise and engage in widespread reforms are a good start. But conditions that cannot or will not be enforced are meaningless.
Anthony Albanese and the Foreign Minister failed to clearly articulate how the commitments made by the Palestinian Authority will be enforced and the consequences if they fail.
This announcement removes any incentive or diplomatic pressure for the Palestinians to do the things that have always stood in the way of ending the conflict, specifically the recognition of Israel as a Jewish state and the need to negotiate the five final status issues that separate the sides.
Israel will feel wronged and abandoned by a longstanding ally.
The Palestinian Authority will feel that a huge diplomatic prize has been dropped in its lap, despite its consistent failures to reform, democratise and agree to peaceful coexistence alongside a Jewish state.
Hamas and other Islamist groups will see that barbarity on a grand scale can lead to desired political transformation.
While we believe that the government sincerely believes in a two-state solution and that these moves will help achieve it, we fear that its actions, intended to sideline extremists, will have the exact opposite effect.
It will encourage Hamas to keep fighting and heap more misery on its people, and it will invigorate the most extreme elements of the anti-Israel movement, those who have targeted electorate offices, galleries, Jewish families, individuals and diners in Melbourne alleys to escalate their own activities.
There is a story in Greek mythology of Procrustes, who sought to fit travellers into a bed by hacking or stretching them into size, instead of adjusting the bed.
It is a parable for seeking to solve a problem in the most absurd way, of lacking the right response to a problem and mutilating one’s way to a solution.
In its desperation to ease our fatigue with this war and this conflict, our government has now presented its solution. Except it is no solution at all.
Merely a guarantee of more false dawns and the inevitable bloodshed that follows them.
Labor has failed to explain how Palestinian Authority can be a partner in peace
Labor has failed to explain how Palestinian Authority can be a partner in peace
Commentary from co-CEO Alex Ryvchin originally published in The Australian on 12 August 2025.
The government has finally ended years of debate about Palestinian statehood to announce that at the United Nations General Assembly next month, Australia will recognise Palestine.
Foreign Minister Penny Wong spoke of it as a piece of unfinished business. Australia recognised Israel when it declared statehood in 1948, pursuant to the UN’s partition plan endorsed by a majority of states, including, crucially, rival superpowers, the Soviet Union and the United States. It is high time to finish the work the UN started and acknowledge a Palestinian state alongside the Jewish one.
Only there’s a hitch. The reason why Palestine wasn’t created in 1948 wasn’t because of opposition to it. It wasn’t because of settler violence or Benjamin Netanyahu’s hard line or a crisis in Gaza.
It was because the Palestinians rejected it because accepting it would mean permanently entrenching a Jewish state in the Middle East.
Instead, they wagered on civil war buttressed by the Arab world, which dutifully invaded the Jewish state.
Israel wasn’t recognised by the world as a gift bestowed upon the Jewish people.
It was recognised because it had attained statehood by virtue of carefully building the components of a viable, democratic state – a free press, a multi-party political system, a vibrant civil society, organised labour, industry and free markets.
The world merely recognised a reality that had come to pass.
This is what has allowed it to sustain and thrive through incomparable adversity.
Have the Palestinians built the essential components of a viable state capable of withstanding jihadist forces, Iran and the competing tribes and factions that will be salivating at the prospect of claiming Palestine as a staging ground for the final destruction of Israel?
Australia is now committed to recognising as a state something with no agreed borders, no single government in effective control of its territory, and no capacity to live in peace with its neighbours.
In doing so, Australia has abandoned decades of bipartisan consensus which has envisaged Palestinian statehood and recognition as part of a comprehensive peace agreement between Israel, the Palestinians and the Arab states.
The Prime Minister spoke compellingly of the evils of Hamas, its crimes against Israelis and its own people, and the fact that its days of governing are over. All well and good.
But who will now finish the mission of rooting out Hamas in Gaza or stopping it from dominating in the West Bank? The Palestinian Authority? International peacekeepers? Only Israel has shown the willingness and ability to confront Hamas.
The commitments made by the Palestinian Authority to live in peace, demilitarise and engage in widespread reforms are a good start. But conditions that cannot or will not be enforced are meaningless.
Anthony Albanese and the Foreign Minister failed to clearly articulate how the commitments made by the Palestinian Authority will be enforced and the consequences if they fail.
This announcement removes any incentive or diplomatic pressure for the Palestinians to do the things that have always stood in the way of ending the conflict, specifically the recognition of Israel as a Jewish state and the need to negotiate the five final status issues that separate the sides.
Israel will feel wronged and abandoned by a longstanding ally.
The Palestinian Authority will feel that a huge diplomatic prize has been dropped in its lap, despite its consistent failures to reform, democratise and agree to peaceful coexistence alongside a Jewish state.
Hamas and other Islamist groups will see that barbarity on a grand scale can lead to desired political transformation.
While we believe that the government sincerely believes in a two-state solution and that these moves will help achieve it, we fear that its actions, intended to sideline extremists, will have the exact opposite effect.
It will encourage Hamas to keep fighting and heap more misery on its people, and it will invigorate the most extreme elements of the anti-Israel movement, those who have targeted electorate offices, galleries, Jewish families, individuals and diners in Melbourne alleys to escalate their own activities.
There is a story in Greek mythology of Procrustes, who sought to fit travellers into a bed by hacking or stretching them into size, instead of adjusting the bed.
It is a parable for seeking to solve a problem in the most absurd way, of lacking the right response to a problem and mutilating one’s way to a solution.
In its desperation to ease our fatigue with this war and this conflict, our government has now presented its solution. Except it is no solution at all.
Merely a guarantee of more false dawns and the inevitable bloodshed that follows them.
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