Tanya Plibersek snub for NSW ALP shift on Palestine

Acting federal Labor leader Tanya Plibersek has snubbed a push by her party’s NSW branch to give Palestine unqualified recognition as a state, sticking with the federal ALP’s pro-Israel policy endorsed by Bill Shorten.

Ms Plibersek yesterday dismissed a resolution that the ALP’s largest state conference is expected to pass this month as just “discussions at a state level” — despite the Palestinian delegation to Australia declaring it significantly strengthened its negotiating position for statehood.

Palestinian delegation head Izzat Abdulhadi said the anticipated vote by the NSW ALP conference would be a significant step towards a binding Labor Party resolution recognising Palestine at its national conference next year. Mr Abdulhadi said the NSW party vote would be a “serious and substantial step” and send a strong message to Israel that its “illegal settlements” in Palestinian territories were the main ­obstacle to peace.

The strongly worded NSW party motion — while noting previous resolutions at state conferences in 2015 and 2016 — “urges the next Labor government to recognise Palestine”.

Read the article by Brad Norington and Primrose Riordan in The Australian.