UK considered Palestine recognition in 2014 if Israel built settlements now being planned
A picture taken from the E1 corridor shows the Maale Adumim settlement, 30 June 2020
Imran Mulla reports in Middle East Eye on May 2025:
The UK privately decided in 2014 that it would consider recognising a Palestinian state if Israel advanced with the contentious E1 settlement project, Middle East Eye can reveal.
Israel is currently poised to move forward with the settlement plan, which would effectively split the occupied West Bank in two.
“This is how we effectively kill the Palestinian state,” Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, who also oversees settlement activity and civilian affairs in the West Bank, said last Tuesday. Although the construction plan dates back to the 1990s, its implementation has repeatedly been delayed due to strong international opposition.
Britain’s Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition government publicly criticised the plan in 2014. But multiple Foreign Office sources with knowledge of the matter told MEE that privately, the government went much further and decided it would consider recognising Palestine if the Israeli government moved forward with the project.
Responding to the revelation, Labour MP Kim Johnson said: “Even the last Tory government acknowledged the necessity of recognising the state of Palestine in the event of any further Israeli illegal annexation of Palestinian land and escalation of a threat to the viability of a Palestinian state.” She added: “Britain must unilaterally recognise the state of Palestine without any further delay.”
Alon Liel, who was formerly director general of Israel’s foreign ministry and adviser to Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, told MEE he believes UK support would be vital in helping to secure Palestinian statehood.
“Britain’s position on the two states issue and the recognition of the state of Palestine is critical mainly because of its historic responsibility,” said Liel, a founding member of the Policy Working Group, an Israeli organisation which opposes Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territory.
“British recognition of Palestine will save the two-states idea. The Labour Party has the recognition issue on its platform and should proceed and implement its commitment in order to avoid a further Middle Eastern deterioration that will endanger Europe too.”