Congratulations Prime Minister: Recognition isn’t peace — it’s permission

This September, France will press ahead with a unilateral recognition of a Palestinian state at the United Nations General Assembly. President Emmanuel Macron’s move is not born of diplomatic optimism but political desperation—over Gaza’s humanitarian horror, over the global paralysis of peace efforts, and over the rising fury in France’s restive banlieues. Several European nations have already followed and France is courting Australia to follow suit.

To many, recognition feels morally irresistible. Gaza lies in ruins. More than 30,000 civilians are dead. Medical aid has partially collapsed. Aid is choked off. The images flood our screens—of bloodied children, of aid convoys stuck, of funerals and rubble. At rallies across Sydney and Melbourne, the cry is insistent: “Recognise Palestine now.”

Labor’s Left has taken up the chant. The party’s National Policy Platform commits Labor to recognition “when it advances a two-state solution.” For many in the ALP, that time is now. The demands are emotionally urgent, electorally potent. The Jewish vote may carry weight in Macnamara—but the Muslim vote dominates in Blaxland, Calwell, Wills, and Watson. To delay, many believe, is to betray.

Supporters insist that recognition would restore diplomatic balance, revive the legitimacy of the Palestinian Authority, and isolate Hamas. That it would force and punish Netanyahu’s Government over its intransigence and realign Australia with the moral majority of the international community. Over 140 UN member states already recognise Palestine. Why not us?

This week, when asked why Australia, if it supports a two-state solution, doesn’t simply recognise Palestine now, Anthony Albanese replied:
“You need to recognise a Palestinian state as part of moving forward. How do you exclude Hamas from any involvement? How do you ensure that a Palestinian state operates in an appropriate way that does not threaten the existence of Israel? We won’t do any decision as a gesture. We will do it as a way forward if the circumstances are met.”

That measured position may not win instant applause from those demanding symbolic action—but it is exactly the kind of leadership this moment demands. The Prime Minister’s refusal to trade integrity for symbolism is right.

Recognition is not a slogan. It is not a TikTok trend. It is not a reward to be traded for applause or short-term political relief. It is a solemn act of diplomacy that must serve peace, not performance. It is a strategic act with real-world consequences. And before Australia ever takes such a step, three essential questions must be answered:

1. Does it align with our international partners?
2. Does it serve our national security interests?
3. Will it strengthen or damage our social cohesion?

Right now, the answers to all three caution against premature recognition.

International alignment

Australia’s closest allies – the US, UK, and Germany – have not joined France, Ireland, or Spain in unilaterally recognising a Palestinian state. Washington has repeatedly called such gestures “unproductive” and warned that they undermine efforts toward a negotiated solution.

This matters because Australia is deeply embedded in a network of defence, intelligence and cyber cooperation with these allies. At a time when AUKUS is under bipartisan review in the US, and when global security threats—from the Red Sea to the Taiwan Strait—require unprecedented collaboration, now is the worst possible moment to diverge from our most critical partners.

Yes of course, Australia is sovereign. But sovereignty does not mean recklessness. Recognition done in isolation risks weakening the credibility we need to exercise greater influence on issues. 

Leadership isn’t about joining a chorus. It is about good decision making.

National security: the intelligence and capability cost

Israel is one of the few democracies with proven battlefield technologies in cyber security, missile defence, UAV systems, and AI-integrated warfare. These are not theoretical capabilities. Australia has begun working them into the ADF’s future operating platforms—especially in areas like electronic warfare and autonomous targeting systems.

When countries have unilaterally recognised Palestine, Israel has responded swiftly: recalling ambassadors, suspending defence exchanges, and delaying technology transfers. France may survive that. Australia, which lacks indigenous equivalents, cannot afford to.

But this is about more than hardware. It’s about trust.

Bilateral intelligence-sharing—especially in counter-terrorism, cyber intrusion, and emerging threats—is built on mutual confidence. A symbolic gesture that signals diplomatic distance risks disrupting the very cooperation that protects Australian lives. Remember it was Israeli intelligence that prevented an attack on an Etihad flight from Sydney to Abu Dhabi in 2017.

If recognition undermines that partnership, it doesn’t just damage our Middle East policy and security—it weakens our defence posture in a region where China, Iran and Russia are becoming increasingly assertive.

The stakes are far higher than slogans suggest.

Social cohesion: the domestic cost

This is the hardest truth of all—and the one too many ignore. Since the October 7 Hamas attacks and Israel’s subsequent response in Gaza, antisemitism in Australia has surged to levels unseen in decades.

Synagogues have been firebombed. A Jewish childcare centre attacked. Jewish schools have received bomb threats. Students have been harassed, Jewish people assaulted, and online hate has exploded. ASIO has confirmed that antisemitism is now the top domestic terror threat in Australia.

In this environment, recognition will not be seen as a diplomatic move. It will be interpreted as vindication. October 7 gave antisemites cover. Recognition now would give them cause. The sense of triumph among extremists would deepen. 

This is not about denying Palestinian aspirations. It certainly is not about “weaponising antisemitism”, as some would say. It’s about protecting every Australian—Jewish, Muslim, Christian or otherwise—from being turned into a symbol in someone else’s ideological war.

Australia’s multicultural success story rests on shared respect. Policy that emboldens one group to scapegoat another is not diplomacy. It is social arson.

And it is the Jewish community—one of the smallest in number, but most targeted in recent months—that will pay the price.

Recognition, in this atmosphere, will not calm the country. It will embolden the worst actors. It will validate those who believe pressure works—who believe that shouting down Jewish speakers, hounding Jewish businesses, and desecrating Jewish places of worship is how one bends foreign policy to their will.

The issue is not appeasement. It is reward.

Recognition would send a message: that the more noise, the more threat, the more hostility toward Jewish Australians, the more the system listens. That political outcomes are driven not by principle but by pressure. And that, ultimately, those who harass and intimidate Australia’s Jewish community will be the ones who feel triumphant.

For Australia’s Jewish community, a unilateral recognition would not be a gesture of balance. It would be read—deeply, bitterly—as betrayal. 

If policy begins to respond to intimidation rather than integrity, we are not recognising a state. We are licensing scapegoating. We are opening the door to a new age of permissible hatred—hatred thinly veiled in politics, but rooted in something far older and more toxic.

Sociologist René Girard warned that in times of social stress, societies instinctively seek scapegoats—symbols upon whom the collective anxiety can be projected. History is unambiguous about who that scapegoat has so often been.

Today, in this new intersection of identity politics and anti-colonial fervour, the Jew has returned to that role. A generation raised on hashtags and virtue signalling sees in Israel not just a nation, but a cipher for everything they’ve been taught to abhor: whiteness, capitalism, nationalism, strength. To them, Israel is not a country—it is a metaphor. And Australian Jews, as proxies, pay the price.

What recognition risks doing is codifying that metaphor into statecraft beyond the childish stunts performed in our parliaments. It makes permanent a worldview that turns Jews into the final obstacle on the road to historical redemption.

Palestinian statehood is no longer just about diplomacy. It has become a cultural obsession, a performative badge in the progressive morality play. A way to signal virtue and renounce sin. But policy cannot be built on absolution rituals. It must be built on fact.

A better way forward: reform, not reward

The facts are stark. The Palestinian Authority has not held elections since 2006. It does not control Gaza. It governs through fiat. It is corrupt, weak, and domestically despised. Hamas remains embedded in Gaza’s ruins, still holding Israeli hostages, still firing rockets, still vowing to return to October 7 “again and again”. It declares it does not matter “how many martyrs” amongst Gazan civilians die in the pursuits of its Islamist fantasies.

These are not the foundations of a state. They are the hallmarks of dysfunction.

None of this is to suggest that Palestinian statehood isn’t a legitimate goal. It is. Nor does it mean Australia should remain passive. It should not.

But recognition should be the end of a reform process—not the beginning of one.

Recognition today is not empowerment. It is fiction. It confers legitimacy on a political vacuum. It dignifies paralysis. It substitutes moral theatre for measurable reform. And when the illusion inevitably shatters—when there are no elections, no disarmament, no reconciliation—Palestinian disillusionment will not only turn inward. It will turn, violently, outward.

The rage will be real. And Australia will be blamed for selling a dream we could never deliver.

The alternative: not denial, but discipline

Australia should not abandon Palestinian statehood. But we must insist on a state worth recognising.

There is a better path: recognition conditioned on serious and real reform. Link it to elections. Demand governance transparency. Tie it to the disarmament of Hamas. Build it around a stabilisation force composed of Arab partners. Elevate moderate Palestinian voices. Partner with countries in our Region, especially Indonesia, the world’s largest Muslim democracy, to lead Track 2 dialogues that privilege reform over rejectionism. 

And in the meantime, increase humanitarian aid—real aid, distributed directly, not siphoned through broken channels. Don’t just provide money, provide expertise. Train border security forces. Rebuild capacity, not ideology. This is not foot-dragging. It is statecraft.

And it sends the clearest signal: Australia will not trade policy for placards. We will not hand out statehood as a consolation prize for chaos. We will earn peace through structure, not slogans.

In an age of Instagram justice and global theatre, withholding a symbol can look like weakness. But restraint is not cowardice—it is character.

Foreign Minister Penny Wong has often reminded Israel of the virtue of restraint. Now, that virtue must be applied at home. The courage the Prime Minister exhibited to say not yet—not in this way, not in this moment—is the difference between moral posturing and moral seriousness.

And it sends a clear message: Australia believes in peace, but not in pretending. We won’t trade statehood for slogans, or stability for sentiment.

The easy move would be to cave to pressure—to follow the parade, declare recognition, and soak in a moment of moral theatre. But the right move is the harder one: to insist on conditions, to demand reform, and to protect the national interest without apology. 

That is exactly what the Prime Minister did this week. His words reflect the kind of leadership we need more of: steady, principled, resistant to performance politics. He recognised the difference between an aspiration and a reality, between a policy and a provocation.

In doing so, he reminded us that the road to justice is not paved with gestures. It is built with responsibility, step by step, condition by condition—until peace becomes more than a slogan.

That is the Australia we should all want to live in.

Adam Slonim is presenter of the Behind The Headlines podcast and a commentator.