Coalition would still revoke Palestine recognition

A Coalition government would still revoke Australia’s recognition of a Palestinian state, but what that would involve won’t be known until it takes office, Opposition foreign affairs spokesperson Ted O’Brien has said.

Asked by The AJN at an Australian Jewish Association (AJA) Zoom meeting on Wednesday night whether the August 2025 shadow cabinet resolution remained policy under Opposition Leader Angus Taylor, O’Brien said it did.

“Our position hasn’t changed,” he said.

On what revocation would involve, he said: “To be honest, we won’t really know until we’re in government to see where things end up, because unfortunately the relationship has been moving at great pace, so we don’t know what we’re dealing with.”

O’Brien said Prime Minister Anthony Albanese had attached conditions to recognition, listing demilitarisation, no role for Hamas and democratic elections.

“Those things were taken out of the Labor platform this year,” he said.

“I don’t believe that Labor’s conditions will be met by the time we come to government, but it would be imprudent for me to sort of have a guess as to where things are going to be at.”

Labor’s national conference in July adopted a platform that dropped explicit calls for Hamas’ disarmament and Palestinian Authority reform. Albanese has said the platform “has got the balance right”.

O’Brien also pointed to the recent postponement of Palestinian elections, asking: “Where was the outrage from Labor?” Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas last month pushed legislative elections due on November 28 back to September 2027.

Earlier in the meeting, O’Brien described premature recognition as “probably the biggest mistake” of the Albanese government in its dealings with Israel, but said the relationship “can be repaired”.

He said Labor “did the wrong thing” in reversing the Morrison government’s recognition of West Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, while adding that he did not want to pre-empt any settlement between Israelis and Palestinians.

Asked whether taxpayer-funded foreign aid, including funding for UNRWA, needed a different approach, he replied, “Yes, it does,” but said he was not in a position to announce policy.

O’Brien also said he held the federal government responsible for damage to social cohesion, describing the Jewish community as “the biggest victims” of that breakdown.

“The answer, therefore, is strong leadership,” he said. “We’re not getting that from this prime minister. We’re not getting it from the foreign minister.