KEIR Starmer has bowed to pressure and has pledged to recognise the state of Palestine in September.
The Prime Minister told an emergency Cabinet meeting on Tuesday that Britain would follow France’s lead in recognising a Palestinian state – if Israel failed to meet a list of demands including a commitment to delivering a two-state solution.
Israel would need to heed all of the UK Government’s demands, which also included a commitment to ending the annexation of Palestinian land in the West Bank and taking steps to ending the “appalling situation in Gaza” if it wishes to prevent Palestinian recognition.
It follows days of intense pressure on the Prime Minister, with nearly 40% of all MPs in the Commons demanding he took the step.
According to a readout from the Cabinet meeting in Downing Street, Starmer said that he believed it necessary because of the "diminishing prospect of a peace process towards a two-state solution".
It added: "[Starmer] reiterated that there is no equivalence between Israel and Hamas and that our demands on Hamas remain, that they must release all the hostages, sign up to a ceasefire, accept that they will play no role in the government of Gaza, and disarm."
The Prime Minister will make an "assessment" before the United Nations General Assembly beginning on September 9 "before making a final decision" to ensure that "no one side will have a veto".
The statement from No 10 added: "He reiterated that he had taken this action to protect the viability of the two-state solution, and that the immediate focus must be to get more aid urgently into Gaza, and that work would continue to bring allies on board with the plan that delivers a long-term settlement to the conflict."
Speaking at a press conference in Downing Street, Starmer said that "we need to see at least 500 trucks entering Gaza every day" as the country continues to impose a blockade on food and other essential supplies reaching the territory.
The Integrated Food Security Phase Classification, a UN-backed initiative, said on Tuesday that the "worst-case scenario of famine" was currently unfolding in the Gaza Strip and it was announced that the death toll in the territory passed 60,000 earlier in the day.
The Israeli military barred foreign journalists on Tuesday from filming out of the sides of planes airdropping small amounts of aid for fear it would lay bare the scale of the devastation.
[[Gaza]] featured heavily in conversations Donald Trump had with Keir Starmer during his trip to Scotland and the announcement came just after the US president began his journey back to America.
There are concerns that recognition, once a key demand of pro-Palestine activists, was now largely a symbolic gesture given the scale of the destruction and death in Gaza.
Richard McNeil-Willson, a lecturer in the Islamic and Middle Eastern studies department at Edinburgh University, told The National that recognition was "farcically below the bare minimum of what is required right now in the midst of a genocide and man-made famine in Gaza".
First Minister John Swinney, who also discussed [[Gaza]] with Trump, said that while he welcomed the "intent behind this announcement" it "must not be conditional and must be backed by sanctions against Israel if the violence continues".
He added: "Israel must today agree to a ceasefire and allow humanitarian aid to flow in much more volume to address the starvation being faced in Gaza.
“A two-state solution is the only way that the Palestinian and Israeli peoples can have a future, living side-by-side in peace and security. The Palestinian people deserve no less."
Scottish Green's leader Patrick Harvie said the strings attached to recognition were "an insult to the Palestinians’ right to self determination".
He added: "Keir Starmer’s words would carry some meaning if he immediately recognised the state of Palestine, called out the ongoing genocide, and stopped aiding and abetting the Israeli military by helping train their personnel or allowing UK-based arms dealers to sell them weapons for profit."
Israel “rejects the statement by the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom”, the country’s foreign ministry said.
A statement on social media site X/Twitter, from the Israeli government, added: “The shift in the British Government’s position at this time, following the French move and internal political pressures, constitutes a reward for Hamas and harms efforts to achieve a ceasefire in Gaza and a framework for the release of hostages.”
