Today, Tuesday, Spain, Ireland and Norway officially recognize the state of Palestine.
– The international community and the EU have been talking about supporting a two-state solution for decades. However, we are no closer to realizing this solution. We strongly believe that if we do not change our approach, we will never achieve this objective, Irish Foreign Secretary Michael Martin said on Monday.
Finland is not going to do this in the near future. Foreign minister Elina Valtonen (collect.) Finland is ready to recognize the state of Palestine when the two-state model is realized through a sustainable peace process.
A researcher familiar with the Middle East conflict says that Finland should recognize Palestine now.
– This is now a window to try to do something more actively in front of this two-state model. And that window will close, senior researcher at the Foreign Policy Institute Timo R. Stewart says.
Most of the countries of the world have recognized Palestine
In practice, recognizing Palestine means that states officially say that Palestine is an existing state and must be treated accordingly, says Stewart.
The two-state model is about establishing an independent Palestinian state alongside Israel. For example, European countries support the two-state model with the 1967 borders. This means that Palestine would be established in the West Bank and Gaza, which Israel occupied in 1967.
So far, Palestine has been recognized by 146 countries, including Norway, Ireland and Spain. The EU country Slovenia has also announced that it will recognize Palestine in mid-June. Sweden already recognized Palestine in 2014.
According to Stewart, Finland reads the situation of the peace process differently than the countries that have now recognized Palestine, which also want to take a more active role in implementing the two-state model.
– Finland apparently still wants to hold on to the idea that since this recognition can only be done once, it will be used as part of some kind of peace process. According to these other states, the problem is that there is no process.
The framework for the establishment of a Palestinian state was created in the Oslo peace process of the 1990s. According to it, a Palestinian state would be established in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. The Palestinian Authority was established to administer parts of these territories.
The most difficult questions, such as the fate of Israeli settlements and the status of Jerusalem, were left out of the Oslo accords. They were to be negotiated after a five-year transition period.
30 years later, these questions are still unresolved. In practice, Israel has made the establishment of an independent Palestinian state very difficult by expanding its illegal settlements in the West Bank. The current Israeli government has also publicly stated that it does not accept an independent Palestinian state in the occupied territories.
The recognition gives hope to the Palestinians
Stewart himself says he has changed his mind about recognizing Palestine.
He says he feared that recognizing a Palestinian state before resolving the biggest issues of dispute would remain an empty gesture without concrete action. At that time, it was as if recognizing the current situation of the Palestinian territories under Israeli occupation.
– The Palestinian Authority has partial autonomy in some parts of the West Bank, nothing else. It’s more of a municipal government under occupation than a state, says Stewart.
With the war in Gaza, the recognition of Palestine has become a very urgent issue, says Stewart.
The Palestinian Authority led by the Fatah party is very unpopular in the eyes of the Palestinians.
The Fatah-led Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) gave up armed resistance in the Oslo peace process. The Palestinian Authority began security cooperation with Israel, which has made it look like a subcontractor of the Israeli occupation. Since these concessions have not brought the realization of a Palestinian state any closer, extremist movements like Hamas are growing in popularity.
At the same time, the situation in the West Bank has been very violent for months – more than 500 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli army and settler bullets. The Palestinian Authority, suffering from great financial difficulties, is on the verge of collapse.
– It’s getting busy now. If the Palestinian Authority collapses and the situation in the West Bank turns into an open uprising, then all the work that Finland and other European countries have done for decades for an independent Palestine may be lost. That path would be very dark for both Israelis and Palestinians.
According to Stewart, the recognition of Palestine now would give the Palestinians hope that the peace process is still ongoing, and that the international community has the political will to promote it.
Stewart: Israel should be pressured into a two-state solution
The recognition of Palestine is a message to Israel that its actions that hinder the peace process are not acceptable, says Stewart.
– Israel has not had any pressure to change, for example, its settlement policy in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.
Israel has taken a very cautious approach to the recognition of Palestine and has invited the ambassadors of Spain, Ireland and Norway for an interview, among others.
According to Stewart, the EU and Israel’s European trading partners must influence Israel by raising the price of the current situation and make it clear that refusing the two-state model has consequences for the relations between the countries.
The researcher says that Finland and the EU also have leverage in the direction of the Palestinian Authority, because the Palestinian Authority is dependent on international support. The Palestinian Authority has not held elections for almost 20 years. In addition, the Palestinian Authority itself is guilty of trampling on the basic rights of its citizens.
– The Palestinian Authority cannot make significant reforms without power. One way to support these reforms, which are also important for Europe, is to recognize the independence of Palestine and thus strengthen the right of the Palestinian Authority to power.
First of all, however, a ceasefire must be achieved in Gaza.
– This problem has been before the eyes of the international community for decades. People remember that when there is violence. If we want this cycle not to continue from decade to decade, then something has to be done about it, says Stewart.