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Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has announced Australia will recognise a state of Palestine when the United Nations’ General Assembly meets in September.
“Australia will recognise the right of the Palestinian people to a state of their own, predicated on the commitments Australia has received from the Palestinian Authority,” he said during a press conference in Canberra on Monday.
“We will work with the international community to make this right a reality.”
Cabinet met in Canberra earlier on Monday, where it signed off on statehood.
More than 140 of 193 UN member states already recognise Palestine.
“A two-state solution is humanity’s best hope to break the cycle of violence in the Middle East and to bring an end to the conflict, suffering and starvation in Gaza,” Albanese said during Monday’s press conference.
“The international community’s vision for a just and lasting peace in the Middle East always encompassed two states living side-by-side with internationally recognised borders — a state of Israel and a state of Palestine with security for the people of both nations.”
Albanese said until both Israeli and Palestinian statehood was made permanent, peace would only ever be temporary.
Any recognition would need to guarantee that the designated terror group Hamas, which de facto governs Gaza, played no role in its future government, the prime minister said.
“The Palestinian Authority has reaffirmed it recognises Israel’s right to exist in peace and security,” he said.
“It has committed to demilitarise and to hold general elections,” Albanese said.

The Palestinian Authority was established in 1994 to govern the Palestinian autonomous territories of the West Bank (including East Jerusalem) and the Gaza Strip under the Oslo Accords. The Fatah-ruled authority governs the West Bank.

A man and a woman are speaking into microphones as they stand behind two separate lecterns during a press conference. There are Australian and Aboriginal flags placed on both sides.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said Australia will work with the international community to make the right of the Palestinian people to a state of their own a reality. Source: AAP / Lukas Coch

It controlled the Gaza Strip up until 2006, when Hamas won parliamentary elections and took control of the Strip following a brief civil war in 2007. It does not have a presence in Gaza.

Albanese also revealed he spoke on Thursday to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, saying the situation in Gaza had gone “beyond the world’s worst fears” and urged for a political solution to the conflict.
Albanese said Israel’s actions — including threats to annex the occupied Palestinian territories and the proposal of permanent forced displacement of the Palestinian people — had risked putting a two-state solution out of reach.
“The Israeli government continues to defy international law and deny sufficient aid, food and water to desperate people, including children,” Albanese said.
“This vital aid must be allowed to get to the people who need it most. This is about much more than drawing a line on a map. This is about delivering a lifeline to the people of Gaza.”
Foreign Minister Penny Wong said the world was seizing an opportunity presented by the Palestinian Authority’s commitments to demilitarisation and elections being held, “as the world seeks to support the Arab League’s efforts to isolate Hamas”.

Wong said Netanyahu’s government had ignored international opposition to its conduct in Gaza.

A woman with grey hair and a black blazer is standing next to the Australian and Aboriginal flags.

Foreign Minister Penny Wong said Australia would help the Palestinian Authority to build capacity and hold it to its commitments. Source: AAP / Mick Tsikas

“This is not the end. It is just the beginning,” Wong said. “There is much more work to do in building a Palestinian state.”

Wong said Australia would help build the capacity of the Palestinian Authority and, alongside the international community, hold it to its commitments.
“The practical implementation of our recognition will be tied to progress on these commitments,” she said.

“We will continue to provide humanitarian aid with our partners to try to help vulnerable civilians to get basic supplies they need, and we will work with partners to build a pathway out of the cycle of violence.”

Opposition has ‘serious concerns’, Greens say recognition long overdue

The Opposition has “serious concerns” about Australia’s plan to recognise Palestinian statehood, leader Sussan Ley said following Albanese’s announcement.
Ley said in a statement that until Albanese’s announcement, it had been bipartisan positions that recognising Palestinian statehood should come only at the end of a peace negotiation process, and that there should be no recognition of a Palestinian state with Hamas still in control of Gaza.
“Despite his words today, the reality is Anthony Albanese has committed Australia to recognising Palestine while hostages remain in tunnels under Gaza and with Hamas still in control of the population of Gaza. Nothing he has said today changes that fact,” Ley said.
Ley said the decision puts Australia at odds with “our most important ally” and “the most consequential player in the conflict in Gaza” — the United States.

US President Donald Trump has remained steadfastly opposed to recognition and maintains that international moves to do so are rewarding Hamas.

A woman wearing a blue top is speaking while standing outside.

Opposition leader Sussan Ley has criticised the government’s decision to recognise Palestinian statehood. Source: AAP / Mick Tsikas

Greens foreign affairs spokesperson David Shoebridge said Australia’s decision was “overdue” and “should have happened decades ago”.

“What Australia has done today is take a tiny step away from a shrinking and discredited minority of states, centred on the US and Israel, to join the overwhelming majority of nations that already recognise Palestine,” he said.
But Shoebridge said “recognition won’t feed starving kids or stop the bombs”, and called on Australia to sanction Israel and stop exporting F-35 fighter jet parts to Israel.

Over the weekend, deputy prime minister Richard Marles was questioned on whether Australia would cease exports of armoured steel and components for F-35 jets to Israel.

Marles said Australia did not supply weapons to Israel and that Australia was part of “the F-35 supply chain”.
Responding to Marles’ remarks on Sunday, Shoebridge said if Australia stopped exporting F-35 parts to Israel, then their fleet would be grounded, and that international law was “crystal clear” that “parts of weapons are weapons”.

Australia Palestine Advocacy Network president Nassher Mashni made similar comments, saying Palestinian recognition could be used as a “veneer” that allowed Israel to “continue brutalising Palestinians without consequences”.

Former ambassador says proposal ‘undermines Israel’s security’

Israel’s ambassador to Australia, Amir Maimon, has criticised the decision to recognise Palestinian statehood.
“By recognising a Palestinian state while Hamas continues to kill, kidnap, and reject peace, Australia undermines Israel’s security, derails hostage negotiations, and hands a victory to those who oppose coexistence,” he said.
The Executive Council of Australian Jewry, Australia’s peak representative body of the Australian Jewish community, said it felt the government’s announcement was a “betrayal and abandonment of the Israeli hostages” held in Gaza.
“Today’s announcement acknowledges the need for all the hostages to be released and for Hamas to be disarmed and removed from power. It accepts that the Palestinians and the Arab States have to recognise and make peace with Israel as the State of the Jewish people, and normalise relations with it,” president Daniel Aghion said in a statement.

“The major flaw in the announcement is that it relegates all of these conditions to the status of a mere promise to be fulfilled at some future time, and says nothing about what will happen if those conditions are not met.”

Israeli PM says international criticism won’t change position

“They know what they would do if they were right next to Melbourne or right next to Sydney,” Netanyahu said.
“You had these horrific attacks. I think that you would do it — at least what we’re doing. Probably, maybe not as efficiently and as precisely as we’re doing it,” Netanyahu said.

“To have European countries and Australia march into that rabbit hole, just like that, fall right into it and buy this canard is disappointing, and I think it’s actually shameful.

A map showing which countries recognise a state of Palestine

Source: SBS News

“It’s not going to change our position. Again, we will not commit national suicide to get a good op-ed for two minutes.”

Announcement follows increased pressure on Australian government

Australia’s federal government has faced increasing pressure to do more as the situation in Gaza has worsened.
The survey from DemosAU found 45 per cent of respondents supported Australia recognising a Palestinian state before a negotiated peace agreement, with 23 per cent opposed.
Levels of support were highest among those aged 18 to 34 at 57 per cent, while people aged 55 and over were more likely to be opposed, at 28 per cent.
Momentum for a Palestinian state has also swelled within Labor’s ranks, as MP Ed Husic and former foreign minister Bob Carr called for action.
Israel has bombarded Gaza since an attack on southern Israel by Hamas on October 7 2023, which killed 1,200 people, with about 250 more taken hostage, according to Israeli tallies.
Israel has since killed more than 61,000 people in Gaza, according to the enclave’s health authorities, and UN sources project more than two million people are facing high levels of acute food insecurity.
Israel has denied that the population is suffering or dying from starvation despite international human rights groups condemning its offensive.
— With additional reporting by the Australian Associated Press
This is a developing story and this article will be updated.
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