OCCUPIED JERUSALEM: Israel’s foreign minister branded a recent international push to recognise Palestinian statehood a “mistake” on Sunday and warned it could trigger an unspecified unilateral response, after reports that Israel plans to annex parts of the occupied West Bank.
Several countries, including France and Britain, have pledged to recognise a Palestinian state on the sidelines of the 80th UN General Assembly this month.
Franco-Israeli relations have been particularly strained since French President Emmanuel Macron announced his country’s plans and co-hosted with Saudi Arabia a conference on the two-state solution at the UN in July.
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer last month said the UK would follow suit in recognising a Palestinian state if Israel failed to agree to a truce in the Gaza war.
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“States like France and the UK that pushed the so-called recognition had made a tremendous mistake,” Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar said at a joint press conference with his visiting Danish counterpart Lars Lokke Rasmussen.
Following through on the plans would make it “harder to get to the peace”, he added.
“It will destabilise the region. It will push Israel also to have unilateral decisions.”
Saar’s remarks come after Israel approved a slew of new West Bank settlements, including a major project just east of Jerusalem known as E1, which the international community has warned threatens the viability of a future Palestinian state.
All Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territory are considered illegal under international law.
Israel’s far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich has said the E1 project intends to “bury the idea of a Palestinian state”.
On Wednesday, he said annexing large parts of the West Bank would “take the idea of dividing our tiny land and establishing a terrorist state at its centre off the agenda once and for all”.
Even as the war in Gaza rages, violence has also rocked the West Bank.
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