Palestinian Authority

The United States’s 20-point plan to end Israel’s war in Gaza is not the same as the draft proposed by a group of Arab and Muslim countries, Pakistan’s Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar has said.

“I made it clear that the 20 points that President (Donald) Trump made public are not ours. Changes were made to our draft. I have the record,” Dar said, speaking to politicians on Friday, according to remarks carried by Dawn news.

His comments come after the White House on Monday released a plan with fanfare that would include a ceasefire, the return of all captives, Hamas disarmament, and a new political architecture for post-war Gaza – one that would exclude the Palestinian group.

Its release came a few minutes before Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stood next to each other at the White House to announce the plan. There, Trump told Hamas it had 72 hours to accept the proposal. On Tuesday, he gave the Palestinian group three to four days to agree to the plan.

Meanwhile, Hamas political bureau member Mohammad Nazzal told Al Jazeera on Thursday that the group was discussing Trump’s plan and would soon announce its position on the proposal. “We are not dealing [with the plan] under the logic that time is a sword pointed at our neck,” Nazzal said.

The published document was presented as a joint effort between Israel, the US and a number of Arab and Muslim countries. Last week, several leaders from the Arab and Muslim world discussed the plan at a meeting on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly in New York.

But while there are no official records of what was discussed at that mini-summit, Axios reported that the proposal announced by the American and Israeli leaders earlier this week contained “significant changes”, requested by Netanyahu, to the draft that had been agreed on by the Arab leaders and Trump.

The amendments were made during a six-hour meeting between Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, US Special Envoy Steve Witkoff and Netanyahu, the report said. The revised version ties Israel’s withdrawal to Hamas’s disarmament and allows Israel – after a withdrawal in stages – to remain within a buffer zone inside the enclave until there are no risks of any “terror threat”, it added.

A group of eight Arab and Muslim countries, including Pakistan, Qatar, Turkiye and Saudi Arabia, welcomed Trump’s announcement in a joint statement.

Qatar has said that it agrees with the aims of the plan, and seeks further discussions on its details.

“If we speak of the main objectives, there are objectives that it [the US plan] achieves, such as ending the war, and there are things that need clarification, which certainly need discussions and negotiations,” Qatar’s Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al Thani told Al Jazeera.

Egypt’s Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty also said that more talks were needed. According to the US proposal, an international body chaired by Trump would have oversight, while a Palestinian technocratic committee would handle civilian governance until the Palestinian Authority reforms itself. To take care of security, according to the proposal, a stabilisation force would be deployed.

“There are a lot of holes that need to be filled; we need more discussions on how to implement it, especially on two important issues – governance and security arrangements,” Abdelatty said on Thursday.

Experts pointed out that there are sticking points. There are questions on whether Hamas will agree to disarm since it has repeatedly said it would not, as the main face of Palestinian armed resistance.

The current proposal also nods vaguely at how reforms may open a pathway to Palestinian statehood, which is not recognised as a right but as the “aspiration of the Palestinian people”.

The plan does not mention the forced displacement of Palestinians from Gaza – a significant shift from Trump’s earlier lambasted position when he suggested the relocation of the population outside the enclave to turn it into the “Riviera of the Middle East”, which was heavily criticised as ethnic cleansing.

It also ruled out the occupation of Gaza and the annexation of the occupied West Bank – actions that Netanya’s far-right coalition members are pushing for.

Should Hamas refuse the deal, Trump ominously told Netanyahu, “You will have our full backing to do what you have to do.”

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas told the UN General Assembly that Palestinians are ready for peace if only Israel would allow it. His address, delivered via video, accused the “extremist Israeli government” of crimes against humanity and made the case for his government’s control of Gaza.

Canada, the United Kingdom, and Australia have recognised Palestinian statehood, a symbolic response to Israel’s ongoing war on Gaza and territorial expansion in the occupied West Bank.

More states, including France and Portugal, are expected to recognise Palestine in the coming days after the announcements on Sunday.

Israel has responded in recent days by doubling down.

Shortly before the announcement, Shosh Bedrosian, a spokesperson for Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, said the PM had called the act “absurd and simply a reward for terrorism”.

At an event in occupied East Jerusalem on September 15, Netanyahu promised his supporters that there “will be no Palestinian state”.

While this act by the three states – Canada, the UK and Australia – grabbed the world’s attention and many headlines, analysts tell Al Jazeera that it is a small, symbolic step in the ongoing indignity, murder and displacement of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians, albeit it one with some weight.

“Recognition matters in this case because close US allies have so far reserved it until the day after a negotiated agreement,” Rida Abu Rass, a Palestinian political scientist, told Al Jazeera.

“It matters because these countries broke ranks. In terms of its impact, Israel finds itself further isolated, and I think that’s meaningful.”

On the same day as recognition was announced, at least 55 Palestinians were killed in Israeli attacks on Gaza on Sunday. At least 37 of them were killed in Gaza City, where the Israeli army has unleashed another brutal campaign of violence.

Performative recognition?

Analysts have expressed scepticism that recognition might improve the material conditions of Palestinians currently suffering under Israeli aggression.

Israel has killed at least 65,283 people and wounded 166,575 in its war on Gaza since October 2023; figures that are thought by many experts to be much higher. During the October 7, 2023, Hamas-led attacks on Israel, 1,139 people died, and another 200 or so were taken captive.

Meanwhile, in the occupied West Bank, the Israeli military and violent settler attacks have killed more than 1,000 people, as the Israeli government threatens to completely annex the entire territory.

Israel’s war, which both Israeli and international experts and human rights groups call a genocide, is not expected to subside after Sunday’s actions, analysts said.

“As long as it doesn’t come with concrete actions, such as sanctions, arms embargo, and the implementation of a no-fly zone in occupied Palestine with a coalition of forces from the international community to alleviate the suffering of the people, I remain pessimistic,” Chris Osieck, a freelance researcher who has contributed to investigations from Forensic Architecture and Bellingcat on Palestine and Israel, told Al Jazeera.

Mohamad Elmasry, a professor at the Doha Institute for Graduate Studies, told Al Jazeera that the move is mainly performative.

“I think they’re under increasing pressure from the international community and also from their local populations to do something,” he said.

“This is, I think, their way of doing something or saying that they did something without actually taking substantive action.”

Still, recognition does mean that the three countries can now enter into treaties with the Palestinian government and can name full ambassadors.

For its part, the UK will recognise Husam Zomlot as the Palestinian ambassador to the UK.

Zomlot said in a statement that the “long-overdue recognition marks an end to Britain’s denial of the Palestinian people’s inalienable right to self-determination, freedom and independence in our homeland”.

“It marks an irreversible step towards justice, peace and the correction of historic wrongs, including Britain’s colonial legacy, the Balfour Declaration and its role in the dispossession of the Palestinian people,” he said.

Joining international organisations

Much of the world already recognises the State of Palestine.

The recent additions mean that only the United States, a handful of European and Baltic states, South Korea, Japan, and a few other states do not recognise Palestine.

However, even with most of the world on board with Palestinian statehood, the country is still not a full member state of the United Nations.

“[Recognition] brings no new UN privileges, nor does it enable Palestine to become a member of new intergovernmental institutions – not without US support,” Abu Rass said.

“Palestine is currently a ‘non-member observer state’,” he explained. “To become a full member would require the recommendation of the UN Security Council [followed by UN General Assembly vote] – unlikely, to say the least, given US veto powers.”

Still, it could be a first step.

International pressure has intensified on Israel to end its war on Gaza, particularly from Europe. Boycott campaigns are gaining momentum that could see Israel expelled from Eurovision and participation in international sporting competitions.

And the European Union has recently discussed increasing tariffs on some Israeli goods and applying sanctions to some Israeli leaders.

“Recognition has no direct impact on Israel’s actions in Gaza, but it may signal these countries’ willingness to take real measures, which would have a direct impact on Israel’s actions in Gaza, such as two-way arms embargos – meaning, neither selling weapons to Israel, nor buying weapons from Israeli manufacturers,” Abu Rass said.

Leaders ‘saving face’

Analysts told Al Jazeera they believe some Western states, despite discussing Palestinian recognition for months, are taking the step as a punishment for Israel’s aggression on Gaza and the occupied West Bank. This is bolstered by conditional support for statehood expressed by some states.

They say that these leaders are responding to myriad domestic pressures in their own countries, including pressure from pro-Israel groups with ties to establishment parties, at the same time that a growing chorus of constituents is calling for state action and penalties to stop genocide.

“This is happening now because of growing domestic pressures on these centre-left governments,” Abu Rass said.

“Nothing changed, per se [but] what we’re seeing is a slow, cumulative reaction to a low simmer – a growing liberal disaffection – and these steps should be seen as a low-cost way to satisfy constituents’ demands.”

“They’re saving face,” Abu Rass added.

In July, the UK’s Prime Minister Keir Starmer said he would recognise Palestine unless Israel took “substantive steps” to end its war on Gaza.

On Sunday, Starmer reiterated that recognition comes as a response to the political realities in Israel and Palestine today.

“This is intended to further that cause,” Starmer said on Sunday. “It’s done now because I’m particularly concerned that the idea of a two-state solution is reducing and feels further away today than it has for many years.”

Australia also made its recognition conditional, with Prime Minister Anthony Albanese saying: “Further steps, including the establishment of diplomatic relations and the opening of embassies, will be considered as the Palestinian Authority makes further progress on commitments to reform.”

A special burden

One hundred and eight years ago, the British government signed the Balfour Declaration, declaring its support for a “national home for the Jewish people” in the land of Palestine.

The United Kingdom has been a historical ally for the state of Israel against the Palestinians, so recognition of the state is also, to some, a recognition of the UK’s complicity in the displacement and dispossession of Palestinians.

“Britain bears a special burden of responsibility to support the two-state solution,” UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy said during a speech at the UN in July.

Despite the historic symbolism, analysts were not convinced that the future would break from the last 100 years.

“Even if Palestine is recognised by every country in the world, little would change for Palestinians unless the Israeli occupation is dismantled,” Abu Rass said.

“International pressure has a role to play here, but it needs to move further than mere recognition, including sanctions, cutting diplomatic ties, the prosecution of war criminals, and cultural boycotts.”

France says arrest of Hicham Harb, 42 years after attack, made possible by upcoming recognition of Palestinian state.

The Palestinian Authority (PA) has arrested a key suspect in a deadly 1982 attack on a Jewish restaurant in Paris in a move that comes amid France’s preparations to recognise a Palestinian state.

The terror attack on the Jo Goldenberg restaurant in the Jewish quarter of Le Marais on August 9, 1982, killed six and left 22 others injured.

France’s National Anti-Terrorism Prosecutor’s Office said in a statement on Friday that Interpol had informed it of the arrest of Hicham Harb by Palestinian authorities under a 2015 international warrant.

President Emmanuel Macron said that the suspect had been arrested in the occupied West Bank and that his country was now working with the PA to ensure his “swift extradition” to France.

Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot posted on X that the arrest had been made possible by Macron’s decision to recognise an independent Palestinian state, “enabling us to request extradition”.

Macron is expected to make the landmark announcement at the United Nations General Assembly in New York next week, with about 10 other countries, including Australia, Belgium, the United Kingdom and Canada.

Wanted man

Harb, whose real name is Mahmoud Khader Abed Adra, was one of France’s most-wanted men and had been the subject of an international arrest warrant for the past 10 years.

The 70-year-old is suspected of leading five other attackers in the gun assault on the restaurant, which was considered the deadliest anti-Semitic attack in France since the second world war.

The assault, blamed on the Palestinian Abu Nidal Organisation, began around midday when a grenade was tossed into the dining room by attackers who then entered the restaurant and opened fire with Polish-made machineguns.

Harb is suspected of having supervised the assault and also of being one of the gunmen who opened fire on diners and passersby.

He was formally indicted by French judges in July on charges of murder and attempted murder in connection with the attack. Harb and five other men in the case were referred to trial.

Another suspect, Abou Zayed, a 66-year-old Norwegian of Palestinian origin, has been in French custody since his 2020 extradition from Norway. He has denied the charges.

Bruno Gendrin and Romain Ruiz, lawyers for Zayed, see the arrest of his alleged accomplice as proof that “the investigation was not complete”.

“As usual, the anti-terrorism courts wanted to rush things, and we are now seeing the consequences,” they told the news agency AFP in a statement.

The Abu Nidal Organisation is categorised as a terror group by the US and Europe.

Palestinians face mass arrests, displacement in the occupied territory as Netanyahu pushes settlement expansion.

Israeli forces have sealed off entrances to Tulkarem in the northern occupied West Bank, further escalating a campaign of raids, arrests and collective punishment that has displaced thousands of Palestinians as the military relentlessly destroys Gaza.

Footage from Thursday night shared by residents showed soldiers marching Palestinians in lines through the streets in what many described as a humiliating show of force.

Tulkarem Governor Abdullah Kamil appealed to the international community on Friday, urging the United Nations General Assembly, the Human Rights Council, and humanitarian groups to act against what he called “crimes” being committed against the city’s nearly 100,000 residents.

Kamil said Israeli forces were “arbitrarily and unjustly” carrying out mass arrests, storming homes, destroying property and “terrorising children and women”, according to the Palestinian news agency Wafa.

On Thursday, Israeli forces in Tulkarem were allegedly struck by what Israel called an explosive device that injured two Israeli soldiers.

Al Jazeera’s Nida Ibrahim, reporting from Doha, described “videos of the Israeli forces dragging hundreds and hundreds of Palestinians from their homes, from their cafes, from even a garage … in a show of humiliation”.

“They’re trying to remind everyone that if there is any incident in any place in the occupied West Bank that they do not like … they’re going to crack down, not just on the perpetrators … but on everyone in that vicinity,” said Ibrahim.

She added that Israel’s crackdown has displaced “tens of thousands of Palestinians out of their homes … rendering the city, the refugee camps into ghost towns”. Ibrahim said Palestinians see this as part of a broader policy, with Israeli forces trying “to crack down on Palestinians and really … remind them who has the upper hand and control in the occupied West Bank”.

Elsewhere in the West Bank, five young Palestinians were shot and wounded by Israeli forces in the village of Deir Jarir, Wafa reported. One of the injured was arrested before receiving medical treatment, according to the village council. Israeli soldiers also closed the village entrance for several hours.

Israeli troops stormed Nablus and the nearby town of Beit Furik at dawn on Friday, raiding several neighbourhoods in the Old City and surrounding areas.

Witnesses said shops were ransacked, while in Beitin, east of Ramallah, Israeli soldiers seized a house and converted it into a military barracks.

The Palestinian Ministry of Foreign Affairs condemned the raids, saying international silence had emboldened Israel to press ahead with unilateral measures aimed at destabilising the territory.

‘There will be no Palestinian state’

The escalation comes as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu advances an illegal settlement expansion plan that would all but eliminate the possibility of a Palestinian state.

On Thursday, he signed an agreement to push forward with construction in the so-called E1 area near the illegal Israeli settlement of Maale Adumim, several kilometres to the east of Jerusalem.

“We are going to fulfil our promise that there will be no Palestinian state. This place belongs to us,” Netanyahu declared at the signing ceremony, adding: “We are going to double the city’s population.”

The project, which has been driven by far-right ministers in the government, Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben-Gvir, covers a 12sq km (4.6sq mile) stretch of land and foresees 3,400 new homes for Israeli settlers. Critics say the plan would cut off large parts of the occupied West Bank from East Jerusalem while linking together major settlement blocs.

Palestinians view East Jerusalem as the capital of their future state. Under international law, all Israeli settlements in occupied territory are illegal, regardless of whether they have Israeli government approval.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’s office has urged the United States to reverse a decision to revoke the Palestinian leader’s visa, just weeks before he was set to attend the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) in New York.

The Palestinian presidency expressed “astonishment” at Washington’s decision on Friday to rescind the visas for Abbas and 80 other Palestinian officials before next month’s high-level meetings at UN headquarters.

Abbas has addressed the General Assembly for many years and generally leads the Palestinian delegation.

“We call upon the American administration to reverse its decision,” Abbas’s spokesperson spokesperson Nabil Abu Rudeineh told The Associated Press on Saturday, warning that the move “will only increase tension and escalation”.

“We have been in contact since yesterday with Arab and foreign countries, especially those directly concerned with this issue. This effort will continue around the clock,” Abu Rudeineh said.

The spokesperson also urged other countries to put pressure on US President Donald Trump’s administration to reverse its decision, including most notably those that have organised a high-level conference about reviving the two-state solution.

Set for September 22, the conference is being co-hosted by France and Saudi Arabia.

‘Ideologically driven’

The Trump administration’s visa curbs come amid growing condemnation of Israel’s devastating war on Palestinians in the Gaza Strip and a wave of Israeli settler and military violence in the occupied West Bank.

The deadly attacks have prompted a growing number of countries to announce plans to recognise an independent Palestinian state at the UN in September.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio justified the revocations on Friday by accusing the Palestinian Authority (PA) and the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) of “not complying with their commitments” and “undermining the prospects for peace”.

Rubio also accused the PA of taking part in “lawfare campaigns”, including appeals to the International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court to hold Israeli accountable for abuses in Gaza and the occupied West Bank.

But Matt Duss, executive vice president at the Center for International Policy, a US-based think tank, accused the Trump administration is “clearly violating diplomatic protocol” in its decision to revoke the visas.

As a host state, the US is meant to grant visas to UN member-state representatives and officials to visit the international body’s headquarters in New York City.

“What’s going on here is clearly ideologically driven,” Duss told Al Jazeera.

“There are people inside the Trump administration who are working closely with the right-wing Israeli government and their goal is to simply remove the Palestinian liberation movement from the international agenda,” he said.

“They do not recognise the Palestinian peoples’ right to state, and they’re both trying to prevent that on the ground in Palestine and now they’re trying to remove them from the international agenda in New York.”

European criticism

Meanwhile, the European Union’s foreign policy chief said the bloc is calling on Washington to reconsider its visa denials.

“In the light of the existing agreements between the UN and its host state, we all urge for this decision to be reconsidered,” Kaja Kallas said on Saturday following a meeting of EU foreign ministers in Copenhagen.

French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot also said the General Assembly “cannot suffer any restrictions on access”.

“The United Nations headquarters is a place of neutrality, a sanctuary dedicated to peace, where conflicts are resolved,” Barrot said.

Meanwhile, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez said he spoke with Abbas on Saturday to express his “firm support” after the “unjust” visa revocations.

“Palestine has the right to make its voice heard at the United Nations and in all international forums,” Sanchez wrote in a post on social media.

WASHINGTON — Secretary of State Marco Rubio has revoked the visas of a number of Palestinian Authority and Palestine Liberation Organization officials ahead of next month’s annual high-level meeting of the U.N. General Assembly, where the groups previously have been represented.

The State Department said in a statement Friday that Rubio also had ordered some new visa applications from Palestinian officials be denied.

The move is the latest in a series of steps the Trump administration has taken to target Palestinians with visa restrictions and comes as the Israeli military declared Gaza’s largest city a combat zone. The State Department also suspended a program that had allowed injured Palestinian children from Gaza to come to the U.S. for medical treatment after a social media outcry by some conservatives.

The State Department didn’t specify how many visas had been revoked or how many applications had been denied. The department did not immediately respond to a request for more specifics.

It wasn’t immediately clear if Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas would be affected.

The agency’s statement did say that representatives assigned to the Palestinian Authority mission at the United Nations would be granted waivers under the U.S. host country agreement with the U.N. so they can continue their New York-based operations.

“It is in our national security interests to hold the PLO and PA accountable for not complying with their commitments, and for undermining the prospects for peace,” the statement said. “Before the PLO and PA can be considered partners for peace, they must consistently repudiate terrorism — including the October 7 massacre — and end incitement to terrorism in education, as required by U.S. law and as promised by the PLO.”

The Palestinian ambassador to the U.N., Riyad Mansour, told reporters Friday that he had just learned of Rubio’s decision and was assessing its impact.

“We will see exactly what it means and how it applies to any of our delegation, and we will respond accordingly,” he said.

Mansour said Abbas was leading the delegation to next month’s U.N. meetings and was expected to address the General Assembly — as he has done for many years. He also was expected to attend a high-level meeting co-chaired by France and Saudi Arabia on Sept. 22 about a two-state solution, which calls for Israel living side by side with an independent Palestine.

Lee writes for the Associated Press. AP writer Edith M. Lederer at the United Nations contributed to this report.

In Britain, citizens protesting against the war in Gaza are being arrested and detained under “terrorism” laws. Activists and legal experts warn that “public safety” is being used as a pretext to silence dissent, curb free speech and criminalise legitimate political activism.

Presenter: Stefanie Dekker

Guests:
Clare Hinchcliffe – mother of imprisoned activist
Laura O’Brien – head of protest team
Matt Kennard – investigative journalist and author

PM’s office says the weapons transfer to the Lebanese army marks the start of a wider disarmament campaign.

Lebanon has launched a plan to disarm Palestinian groups in its refugee camps, beginning with the handover of weapons from Burj al-Barajneh camp in Beirut.

The prime minister’s office announced on Thursday that the weapons transfer to the Lebanese army marks the start of a wider disarmament campaign. More handovers are expected in the coming weeks across Burj al-Barajneh and other camps nationwide.

A Fatah official told the Reuters news agency the arms handed over so far were only illegal weapons that had entered the camp within the previous day. Television footage showed military vehicles inside the camp, though Reuters could not verify what type of weapons were being surrendered.

The initiative follows Lebanon’s commitment under a US-backed truce between Israel and Hezbollah in November, which restricted weapons to six state security forces. Since the November 27, 2024, ceasefire agreement, Israel has continued attacking Lebanon, often on a weekly basis.

The government has tasked the army with producing a strategy by the end of the year to consolidate all arms under state authority.

According to the prime minister’s office, the decision to disarm Palestinian factions was reached in a May meeting between Lebanese President Joseph Aoun and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

Both leaders affirmed Lebanon’s sovereignty and insisted that only the state should hold arms. Lebanese and Palestinian officials later agreed on a timeline and mechanism for the handovers.

For decades, Palestinian groups have maintained control inside Lebanon’s 12 refugee camps, which largely operate outside state jurisdiction. The latest initiative is seen as the most serious effort in years to curb the presence of weapons inside the camps.

Palestinian resistance movements grew out of displacement and political exclusion after the creation of Israel in 1948, when some 750,000 Palestinians were forced from their homes.

Over the years, groups including Fatah, Hamas, and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) established a presence in Lebanon’s camps to continue armed struggle against Israel.

Palestinian refugees in Lebanon remain without key civil rights, such as access to certain jobs and property ownership. With limited opportunities, many have turned to armed factions for protection or representation.

The disarmament push also comes as Hezbollah faces what analysts describe as its greatest military challenge in decades, following Israeli strikes in 2024 that decimated much of its leadership.

Australia will recognise a Palestinian state in September, Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has announced.

Albanese said on Monday that his government would formally announce the move when the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) meets in New York.

“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 at a news conference in Canberra.

Australia’s announcement comes as Canada, France and the United Kingdom are preparing to formally recognise Palestine at the meeting next month, joining the vast majority of UN member states.

It also comes about a week after hundreds of thousands of Australians marched across the Sydney Harbour Bridge to protest Israel’s war in the Gaza Strip.

Speaking a day after the protest, Australian Minister for Foreign Affairs Penny Wong told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) that “there is a risk there will be no Palestine left to recognise.”

“In relation to recognition, I’ve said for over a year now, it’s a matter of when, not if,” Wong added.

The opposition Liberal Party criticised the move, saying it put Australia at odds with the United States, its closest ally, and reversed a bipartisan consensus that there should be no recognition while Hamas remains 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,” Liberal Party leader Sussan Ley said in a statement.

“Recognising a Palestinian state prior to a return of the hostages and defeat of Hamas, as the Government has today, risks delivering Hamas one of its strategic objectives of the horrific terrorism of October 7.”

The Australian Greens, the fourth-largest party in parliament, welcomed the move to recognise Palestine, but said the announcement did not meet the “overwhelming calls from the Australian public for the government to take material action”.

“Millions of Australians have taken to the streets, including 300,000 last weekend in Sydney alone, calling for sanctions and an end to the arms trade with Israel. The Albanese Government is still ignoring this call,” Senator David Shoebridge, the party’s spokesperson on foreign affairs, said in a statement.

The Australian Palestine Advocacy Network (APAN) also criticised the announcement, describing it as a “political fig leaf, letting Israel’s genocide and apartheid continue unchallenged, and distracting from Australia’s complicity in Israeli war crimes via ongoing weapons and components trade”.

“Palestinian rights are not a gift to be granted by Western states. They are not dependent on negotiation with, or the behaviour or approval of their colonial oppressors,” APAN said in a statement.

According to Albanese, Australia’s decision to recognise Palestinians’ right to their own state will be “predicated on the commitments Australia has received from the Palestinian Authority (PA)”.

These “detailed and significant commitments” include the PA reaffirming it “recognises Israel’s right to exist in peace and security” and committing to “demilitarise and to hold general elections”, Albanese said while announcing the decision.

The PA is a governing body that has overseen parts of the Israeli-occupied West Bank since the mid-90s.

It has not held parliamentary elections since 2006 and has been criticised by some Palestinians for helping Israel to keep tight control over residents in the West Bank.

Albanese said the commitments secured by Australia were “an opportunity to deliver self-determination for the people of Palestine in a way that isolates Hamas, disarms it and drives it out of the region once and for all”.

Hamas has been in power in the Gaza Strip since 2007, when it fought a brief war against forces loyal to PA President Mahmoud Abbas.

New Zealand to decide on recognition next month

Meanwhile, New Zealand’s Foreign Minister Winston Peters said on Monday that his country’s cabinet will make a formal decision on Palestinian statehood in September.

“Some of New Zealand’s close partners have opted to recognise a Palestinian state, and some have not,” Peters said in a statement.

“Ultimately, New Zealand has an independent foreign policy, and on this issue, we intend to weigh up the issue carefully and then act according to New Zealand’s principles, values and national interest.”

Peters said that while New Zealand has for some time considered the recognition of a Palestinian state a “matter of when, not if”, the issue is not “straightforward” or “clear-cut”.

“There are a broad range of strongly held views within our Government, Parliament and indeed New Zealand society over the question of recognition of a Palestinian state,” he said.

“It is only right that this complicated issue be approached calmly, cautiously and judiciously. Over the next month, we look forward to canvassing this broad range of views before taking a proposal to Cabinet.”

Of the UN’s 193 member states, 147 already recognise Palestinian statehood, representing some three-quarters of the world’s countries and the vast majority of its population.

Under its 1947 plan to partition Palestine, the UNGA said it would grant 45 percent of the land to an Arab state, though this never eventuated.

The announcements by Australia and New Zealand on Monday came hours after an Israeli attack killed five Al Jazeera staff members in Gaza City, and as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu continues to threaten a full-scale invasion of the city in the north of the Gaza Strip.

Israel’s war on Gaza has killed at least 61,430 people, according to Gaza’s health authorities.

Close to 200 people, including 96 children, have died from starvation under Israel’s punishing siege, according to health authorities.

Canada has become the latest country to announce its intention to recognise a Palestinian state if certain conditions are met. Prime Minister Mark Carney condemned the Israeli government for allowing a catastrophe to unfold in Gaza.

Process launched after visit by Palestinian President Abbas, who said weapons ‘hurt’ Lebanon and Palestine cause.

A joint Lebanese-Palestinian committee tasked with the removal of weapons held by Palestinian factions in Lebanon’s refugee camps has met for the first time to begin hashing out a timetable for disarming the groups.

The Lebanese-Palestinian Dialogue Committee, a government body serving as interlocutor between Palestinian refugees and officials, met on Friday with Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam in attendance.

The group said that “participants agreed to launch a process for the disarmament of weapons according to a specific timetable”.

It added that it also aimed to take steps to “enhance the economic and social rights of Palestinian refugees”.

A Lebanese government source told the news agency AFP that disarmament in the country’s 12 official camps for Palestinian refugees, which host multiple Palestinian factions, including Fatah, its rivals Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and a range of other groups, could begin in mid-June.

Under a decades-old agreement, Lebanese authorities do not control the camps, where security is managed by Palestinian factions.

The meeting comes as the Lebanese government faces increasing international pressure to remove weapons from the Iran-aligned Lebanese armed group Hezbollah, which fought a war with Israel last year.

“The message is clear. There is a new era, a new balance of power, and a new leadership in Lebanon, which is pushing ahead with monopolising arms in the hands of the state,” said Al Jazeera’s Zeina Khodr, reporting from Beirut.

“It has already begun to dismantle Hezbollah’s military infrastructure in southern Lebanon, and the next phase appears to be the disarmament of Palestinian groups in camps before it addresses the issue of Hezbollah’s weapons in the rest of the country,” she said.

Earlier this week, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas – leader of the Palestine Liberation Organization, dominated by his Fatah party, visited Lebanon and said in a speech that the weapons in the camps “hurt Lebanon and the Palestinian cause”.

During Abbas’s visit, he and Lebanese President Joseph Aoun announced an agreement that Palestinian factions would not use Lebanon as a launchpad for any attacks against Israel, and that weapons would be consolidated under the authority of the Lebanese government.

Al Jazeera’s Khodr signalled that several factions appeared to be against disarmement.

“While Abbas’s Palestinian Authority may be recognised internationally as the representative body of the Palestinian people, there are many armed groups, among them, Hamas and [Palestinian] Islamic Jihad, who … believe in armed struggle against Israel,” she said.

“Without consensus among the factions, stability could remain elusive.”