Seeking to turning the tide in Gaza, global community calls out Israel

For the first time, four of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council are likely to extend recognition to Palestine (China and Russia being the other two), isolating the US

After months of looking the other way as Israel unleashed an attack against civilians in Gaza, key Western nations have performed a volte face of a kind. In short order, France, the United Kingdom, and Canada have extended conditional recognition of the state of Palestine in September and the two-state solution ahead of the 80th session of the United Nations (UN) General Assembly. In practical terms, the move is symbolic, since the Palestinian state virtually does not exist. But in the larger geopolitical context, this shift has enormous significance in the international community’s stance on Israel.  For the first time, four of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council are likely to extend recognition to Palestine (China and Russia being the other two), isolating the United States (US). They would join 147 member states — of the UN’s 193 — that recognise Palestine, India being among the earliest to sign on. This shift in position was preceded by a joint declaration by the three countries stating that they were “horrified” by the escalation by Israel in Gaza and condemned the expansion of illegal settlements in the West Bank.

 

The governments of these three allies of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization are responding to a groundswell of public opinion against Israeli atrocities against the Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank. Last week, Slovenia became the first European Union (EU) member state to declare two key Israeli ministers persona non grata for their role in the Gaza offensive.  On July 30, 58 former EU envoys urged the bloc to end arms exports, sanction Israel, and act to stop “atrocity crimes”. Earlier this week, dockworkers in France and Italy blocked shipments of arms components to Israel and called on their government to withdraw diplomatic support for Israel. Germany, where Holocaust history forces a certain implacable support for the state of Israel, announced plans to airlift aid to Gaza, though its support for Israel is intact. Even Saudi Arabia shed its studied indifference to the crisis by airdropping food aid. These declarations round off a week of consequential diplomatic activity. Over July 29 and 30, a high-level UN conference issued the “New York Declaration”, setting out a phased plan to end the nearly eight-decade conflict, culminating with an independent, demilitarised Palestine co-existing with Israel.

 

Around the same time, the eight-nation Hague Group, led by South Africa, hosted a meeting of some 30 nations, including China, Spain, and Qatar, that agreed to a raft of measures against Israeli actions in Gaza —including a ban on supplying arms, on ships transporting weapons and reviewing contracts with links to Israeli companies. UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese attended the meeting and described it as “the most significant political development in the past 20 months”.

 

The question, of course, is how far this overt shift in public opinion will alter the facts on the ground. Since the US continues to support Israel with 70 per cent of its defence equipment, Israel Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu sees no reason to rein in the defence forces in Gaza or settlers in the West Bank. The real test lies in whether Europe will risk US President Donald Trump’s threat of tariffs or worse to actively sanction Israel. Without more draconian pressure, the long-held two-state solution to this eight-decade tragedy will remain as elusive as ever.