Canada to recognise Palestine, joining growing Western bloc confronting Israeli genocide

Canada has announced plans to formally recognise the State of Palestine during the upcoming UN General Assembly session in September, joining a growing list of Western countries challenging the longstanding international protection of Israeli impunity. Prime Minister Mark Carney made the announcement yesterday, aligning Ottawa with France and the UK in what appears to be a coordinated international push to revive the long-dormant two-state solution.

The decision comes as part of the “New York Call,” a joint declaration signed by 17 countries including New Zealand, Australia, Portugal, Finland, and San Marino. While some of the signatories have already recognised Palestine, such as Spain, Ireland and Norway, others, like Australia and New Zealand, indicated that formal recognition may follow in the coming months.

The statement, issued ahead of the conclusion of a three-day UN conference on the Middle East, reaffirmed support for the creation of two democratic states “living side by side in peace within secure and recognised borders” and underscored the need for Gaza to be unified with the illegally occupied West Bank under the Palestinian Authority (PA).

Carney stated that Canada’s recognition of Palestine would be conditional on democratic reforms within the PA and an exclusion of Hamas from future governance. He called for Hamas to disarm, release remaining captives and withdraw from any political role. Nevertheless, Canada’s intention to proceed with recognition has drawn harsh criticism from Tel Aviv and its allies in Washington.

Israel and the US have dismissed recognition of Palestine as a reward for Hamas. Israeli officials labelled the move as “hypocritical” and accused signatory countries of undermining peace efforts. Donald Trump warned it could jeopardise trade talks with Canada, repeating the claim that Palestinian statehood legitimises “terrorism.”

Critics have consistently refuted this assertion, pointing out that Israel has been richly rewarded by the international community for decades, despite committing well-documented war crimes and crimes against humanity, including ethnic cleansing, home demolitions, extrajudicial killings and the construction of illegal settlements in violation of international law.

The vast majority of these violations occurred not only after 1967, but even before the founding of the Israeli state in 1948, when Zionist militias carried out terrorist attacks against British officials and Palestinian civilians alike.

Read: Arab states urge Hamas to step aside for peace plan long rejected by Israel

Western governments, including Britain, responded to Jewish terrorism by granting statehood to European colonialists by allowing the creation of Israel despite its violent foundation. By contrast, Palestinians have been denied sovereignty for more than 75 years and punished collectively whenever they resist Israel’s illegal occupation.

This historical imbalance is compounded by Israel’s repeated rejection of the right of Palestinian self-determination including the 2002 Arab Peace Initiative. That plan, first introduced by Saudi Arabia at the Beirut Summit, offered full normalisation of relations between Israel and the Arab world in exchange for complete withdrawal from the occupied Palestinian territories, a just solution for Palestinian refugees, and the establishment of a sovereign Palestinian state.

Rather than accept the offer, which would have granted peace and reconciliation, Israeli governments opted to expand settlements, deepen apartheid policies and pursue annexation.

France and the UK, who recently announced their intention to recognise Palestine at the UN in September, framed their decisions as necessary to break the current diplomatic deadlock. UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer stated earlier this week that unless Israel takes tangible steps to end its war on Gaza and revive peace talks, London will proceed with recognition unilaterally.

Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said that his government was open to recognition but stressed that “timing is everything.” He reiterated his support for two states and said recognition must be tied to advancing a political solution.

More than 60,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since October 2023. Gaza is now facing mass starvation, the total collapse of its infrastructure, mass displacement at a scale many humanitarian experts describe as genocidal.