Foreign minister says decisions on recognising the state of Palestine are a ‘matter for government’ despite prior resolution from Labor national conferences
Palestinian advocates have called on the Australian government to honour its promises after Penny Wong declined to commit to a timetable for recognising Palestinian statehood.
On Thursday the foreign affairs minister acknowledged a lack of progress towards a two-state solution had consequences for the Palestinian people, but said she could not predict the future.
Distancing herself from the Labor party platform, Wong said any decisions on recognising Palestinian statehood would be “a matter for government”.
The Australia Palestine Advocacy Network said recognising the state of Palestine was “the easiest and simplest step this government can take to join the majority of the world’s nations and support a peaceful resolution”.
“Honouring their promise, and recognising the State of Palestine, is the least this Labor government can do,” the network’s president, Nasser Mashni, said.
“At a time when UN experts and the world’s leading human rights organisations are openly labelling Israel’s policies against Palestinians as the crime of apartheid, we would hope our government would be taking greater action in supporting the Palestinian people in their demand for justice.”
In 2018 and 2021, Labor’s national conference backed a resolution that “supports the recognition and right of Israel and Palestine to exist as two states within secure and recognised borders” and “calls on the next Labor government to recognise Palestine as a state”.
Read the article by Daniel Hurst in The Guardian.