France, the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and Belgium were among 10 nations this week to to recognize a Palestinian state that does not yet exist.
Portugal, Luxembourg, Andorra, Malta and Monaco were the other half. Of 193 United Nations member nations, more than 150 now recognize Palestinian statehood. Most had done so decades ago. The United States and other Western powers have held off, saying Palestinian statehood should be part of a final agreement resolving the decades-old Middle East conflict.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government has opposed Palestinian statehood even before the ongoing Israel-Hamas war and says such a move rewards the militant group that still controls parts of Gaza. He has hinted Israel might take unilateral steps in response, including annexing parts of the West Bank, which would put a viable Palestinian state even further out of reach.
A two-state solution in which a state of Palestine would be created alongside Israel in most or all of the West Bank, Gaza Strip and east Jerusalem — territories Israel seized in the 1967 Mideast war — is still seen internationally as the only way to resolve the conflict.
