Australia has joined others in pledging to recognise a Palestinian state. What would that mean?

NEW YORK - Australia has said it

would recognise a Palestinian state

in September, mirroring similar announcements by France, Britain and Canada in recent weeks.

The moves come amid intensifying global outrage over Israel’s war in the Gaza Strip, which analysts say has killed tens of thousands of Palestinians and left a population of about two million in a state of extreme privation and hunger.

They also came in response to Israel’s actions in the occupied West Bank: Its military activity there has displaced Palestinians en masse in 2025, settlement plans have expanded, and violence by settlers against Palestinians has risen since the Hamas-led Oct 7, 2023, attack on Israel ignited the war.

That assault killed about 1,200 people and led to the abduction of about 250 others to Gaza.

The announcements raise questions about what the recognition of a Palestinian state would mean and what it can actually do.

What is a state?

The criteria for statehood were laid out in an international treaty in 1933.

They include four elements: a permanent population, defined territorial boundaries, a government and an ability to conduct international affairs.

Recognition is an official acknowledgment that a would-be state broadly meets those conditions. It can occur even if an element is in dispute, including territorial boundaries.

Like all legal questions, “interpretation matters”, said law and international affairs professor Zinaida Miller from Northeastern University.

The criteria for recognising a Palestinian state have been met at a basic level, many experts on international law say.

A permanent population and land exist.

The borders, while disputed, are broadly understood to be in Israeli-occupied territories, including the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, which was seized in 1967 in a war with a coalition of Arab states; as well as East Jerusalem, which Israel has effectively annexed.

The Palestinian Authority is a government body that administers part of the West Bank and represents Palestinians.

Its creation was authorised by the Palestine Liberation Organisation, which represents Palestinians internationally.

While there are limits to what the Palestinian Authority can do, given the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Hamas’ control of Gaza, foreign recognition of a Palestinian state would mean the establishment of direct diplomatic contact between the authority and the recognising nation.

Recognition would also send diplomatic and political messages.

It would acknowledge the Palestinian right to self-determination and reject the positions and actions of the Israeli government that undermine that right, Prof Miller said.

‘A basis for added pressure’

A major consequence of recognising Palestinian statehood is that it provides a basis for “a complete revision of bilateral relations with Israel”, said Associate Professor Ardi Imseis from the Queen’s University Faculty of Law in Ontario, a former UN official.

A country that recognises Palestine has to review agreements with Israel to make sure they do not violate its obligations to the Palestinian state.

This would include political and territorial integrity, as well as economic, cultural, social and civil relations, he said.

For example, if an aspect of trade aids or assists Israel in violation of the rights of a Palestinian state, then the recognising nation would have to cease that exchange.

“Practically speaking, recognition would provide a basis for added pressure to be brought to bear by civil society and lawmakers in the recognising state” to change policies and align them with other requirements, Prof Imseis said.

A recognising nation would not have to stop all trade with Israel, said Mr Paul Reichler, a lawyer who represents sovereign states and has argued for the State of Palestine at the International Court of Justice.

But if, for example, a country that recognises a state of Palestine imports agricultural products from farms belonging to settlers in occupied territories, those agreements would be aiding and abetting the commission of a wrongful act, he said.

International law experts note that an advisory ruling from the International Court of Justice in 2024 concluded, among other things, that the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories violated a prohibition on territorial conquest.

A UN majority for recognition already exists

Most countries in the UN – 147 out of 193 – already recognise a Palestinian state.

The addition of Britain and France would offer extra heft because the two countries are permanent members of the UN Security Council, with the power to veto any substantive council resolution, including on the admission of new member states.

The two countries would be bolstering the stance taken by most other nations and sending a political message, but their shift would also have a practical effect.

They would join China and Russia in recognising a Palestinian state and leave the US as the sole permanent member of the Security Council with veto power that is holding out.

The State of Palestine currently has observer status at the UN, and that will not change if the US maintains its opposition to full membership.

What is the goal of recognition?

Britain’s announcement had a stipulation: It said recognition of a Palestinian state would come if Israel did not reach a ceasefire agreement on the war in Gaza by September.

Australia, meanwhile, said its decision was “part of a coordinated global effort building momentum for a two-state solution” to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict – an idea that Israel’s current government has resisted.

Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said on Aug 11 that recognition would be “predicated” on “detailed and significant” commitments received from the Palestinian Authority’s leader, Mr Mahmoud Abbas, to demilitarise, hold general elections and ensure that Hamas plays no role in a future Palestinian state.

That largely echoed conditions set by Canada in late July.

“There are two peoples living between the river and the sea, not one, and they are entitled to separate states in which each of these peoples enjoys the full panoply of civil and human rights,” Mr Reichler, the lawyer, said.

“The only solution is two states, and it so happens that is what international law requires and is reflected in UN resolutions and in determinations of the ICJ,” he said.

Although the declarations of Palestinian statehood may appear symbolic, “small steps” like recognition “make a contribution” to the goal of establishing two states, he said.

Some nations, like Norway, once held off recognising a Palestinian state in the belief that recognition would someday emerge from a negotiated peace process.

With such a process seemingly currently out of reach and outrage over Israeli policies growing, some countries have put recognition first in the hope that it would lead to a peace process.

Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said that the establishment of a Palestinian state would endanger Israel’s security, and he has rejected the notion, particularly since the war in Gaza began.

His governing coalition includes far-right ministers who are settlers and staunchly opposed to a Palestinian state, and he risks their abandoning the bloc if he indicates a willingness to consider it.

In a recent statement, Mr Netanyahu said Britain’s announcement “rewards Hamas’ monstrous terrorism & punishes its victims”. NYTIMES