Keir Starmer<\/a> wants us to believe he\u2019s making a bold moral stand by announcing the UK will recognise a Palestinian state<\/a>.<\/p>\n But look closer, and the truth is far more disturbing. This \u201crecognition\u201d isn\u2019t rooted in justice or principle. It\u2019s a policy so morally upside down, it sounds almost satirical<\/a>.<\/p>\n If Israel continues bombing children, annexing land and starving a population into submission, then, yes, Britain might recognise Palestine<\/a>. But if Israel suddenly behaves, agrees to a ceasefire<\/a> and recommits to peace, then recognition won\u2019t be necessary.<\/p>\n What kind of justice operates on those terms? This is not diplomacy. This is moral blackmail. It is Britain saying to Palestinians: your right to exist is not yours. It depends entirely on the behaviour of your occupier.<\/p>\n When I asked my sister in Gaza what she thought of the UK\u2019s announcement, her first response was to laugh. She said: \u201cI don\u2019t think we really care what the UK has to say about us. We\u2019ll never forget that they\u2019re one of the main reasons we\u2019re in this situation<\/a>. We\u2019re just trying to survive here.\u201d<\/p>\n Of all countries, Britain should know better. It was Britain that helped initiate our dispossession<\/a> with the Balfour Declaration. Britain stood by during the Nakba<\/a>, the displacement of Palestinians when the Israeli state was founded in the aftermath of the Second World War. Britain has armed and funded Israel through occupation, siege and massacre. And now, as Gaza is being starved into history, Britain still can\u2019t bring itself to say: Palestinians deserve a state because they are a people who deserve to live in freedom and dignity.<\/p>\n When my 14-year-old niece asked her mother, \u201cWhat does it mean that they want to recognise us? Don\u2019t we already exist?\u201d, my sister said the family laughed \u2013 not because it was funny, but because it was absurd. Even a child could see the madness: a government saying they might recognise you if your people continue to be killed.<\/p>\n Starmer called Palestinian statehood an \u201cinalienable right\u201d. But a right can\u2019t be delayed, denied or dangled as a threat. If you attach conditions to a right, especially ones dictated by the very state occupying and bombing us, it\u2019s no longer a right but a bargaining chip<\/a>. What\u2019s worse is that it isn\u2019t even sincere. This isn\u2019t about us. It\u2019s about Starmer trying to appear principled while staying comfortably aligned with US policy, arms contracts and the pro-Israel lobby at home.<\/p>\n What Palestinians hear in all this is painfully clear: your suffering alone isn\u2019t enough<\/a>. Your history, your dispossession, the killing of more than 60,000 people in Gaza\u2026 none of it justifies our support. But if we can use your dead to shame Israel into behaving, then yes, we might finally utter the word \u201cPalestine\u201d without choking on it.<\/p>\n It\u2019s grotesque. It\u2019s like saying to a battered woman: \u201cIf your abuser continues, I\u2019ll acknowledge your pain. But if he stops, then you\u2019ll be fine on your own, won\u2019t you?\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/GAZA-HAMBRUNA-FOTOS_24426.jpg\")
A group of Palestinians pray next to the body of a person killed while trying to reach aid trucks entering northern Gaza through the Zikim crossing with Israel (AP)<\/p>\n