Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has defended his government’s decision to begin referring to the West Bank and Gaza as “occupied” and Israeli settlements as “illegal” as the Palestinian government urged Australia to go further by quickly recognising Palestine as a state.
Opposition Leader Peter Dutton began question time on Wednesday by accusing the government of hanging “one of Australia’s closest Middle East partners [out] to dry as part of a backroom deal to avoid an embarrassing factional fight” at next week’s ALP national conference.
“My government is a strong supporter of Israel and its right to exist within the borders. We also support a two-state solution that includes a Palestinian state,” Albanese replied.
He added that the government had adopted the same language as the UK’s conservative government and the European Union.
In a marked change to Israel’s furious response last year to the government’s decision to no longer recognise west Jerusalem as the nation’s capital, the Israeli government has not responded to Tuesday’s announcement, which was revealed by The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age.
While Australian Jewish groups decried the change in language, the Palestinian National Authority’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said it welcomed Australia’s new position as a “significant and important development”.
Read the article by Matthew Knott in The Sydney Morning Herald.