Foreign Affairs Select Committee chair Emily Thornberry has appeared to back calls for the UK to join with the French and other international “friends” in recognising the state of Palestine.
Asked for her view on when the UK should come out in support of recognition, the MP for Islington South said: “The time is coming. If we don’t act now, there will be no Palestine left to recognise. We need to do it with the French. There are a lot of other countries sitting back and waiting.”
The former shadow foreign secretary’s comments came after Emmanuel Macron, the French president, suggested his country plans to recognise Palestine at an international conference set for June.
Emmanuel Macron
France is co-chairing the conference at the UN in New York alongside Saudi Arabia, and Macron has said the conference must be a decisive moment.
Israel’s foreign minister, Gideon Sa’ar, criticised Macron’s comments on social media posting: “Unilateral recognition of a fictional Palestinian state … is a reward for terror and a boost to Hamas.”
The Knesset voted heavily last month against a two-state solution, but the leader of the Israeli opposition, Yair Lapid is open to the possibility if it is clear Hamas play no role in any future Palestinian government.
Macron later wrote on social media that any move to recognition also required commitments from the Palestinians.
Writing in Hebrew on X, he said to be committed to Israel’s security while supporting a Palestinian state “without Hamas”.
“This requires the release of hostages, a ceasefire, humanitarian aid, and a two-state political solution,” Macron wrote. “There is no other path.”
The UK government is currently supportive of a process that leads to an eventual two state solution but the long-standing position remains that it will recognise a Palestinian state at a time that is most conducive to that peace process.
Ireland, Norway, Spain, Sweden, and Mexico were the most recent countries to recognise a Palestinian state in March 2025, but no G20 country has taken the step.
Responding to Macron’s plan for the June conference, Yair Netanayhu wrote “Screw you” on social media.
In a Sunday evening tweet, his father and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wrote: “I love my son Yair, a true Zionist who cares about the future of his country.
“Like every citizen, he is entitled to his personal opinion, although the style of his response to President Macron’s tweet calling for the establishment of a Palestinian state is unacceptable to me.”
