It's time for Starmer's Labour to decide its stance on Palestinian statehood

For its supporters and the public at large, the UK Labour party’s looming decision on how the country recognises the state of Palestine is one of the biggest it faces.

Prime Minister Keir Starmer and Foreign Secretary David Lammy have a statesman-like stand on the issue, which says recognition will come as part of a peace process. But the party faithful gathered in Liverpool for the annual Labour conference this week hunger for something more, by and large seeking swifter action.

Mr Lammy’s job this week is to hold the line for now. “We have never lost sight of the end goal: an irreversible pathway towards a two-state solution,” he declared during his address at the opening of the meeting.

Short of taking the party down that pathway, Mr Lammy can offer smaller measures that set a particular direction. These include restoring funding to the UN Palestinian refugee agency and putting on the table sanctions against the West Bank settlers, including the movement’s leaders who are currently ministers in the Israeli government.

There, undoubtedly, are trade-offs for the world’s most influential countries in making the leap that Spain and Ireland made this summer to recognition. Just last weekend, the Palestinian envoy in Madrid presented his credentials to King Felipe. The governing Liberals in Canada have proposed a four-step move to recognition at the level of the Parliament’s foreign affairs committee.

But for the legally minded, there are certain obligations that the UN puts around state recognition, and these practical hurdles are likely to matter within a government that takes the legalese so seriously. The UK’s is one such government. Even when London’s position on arms exports to Israel was adjusted earlier this month, Mr Lammy and others said the policy was dictated by the legal position not informed by politics.

The last time Labour was in power, the party was active on the Palestine-Israel issue. Across the span of developments from 1997 to 2010, it invested heavily in the practicalities of the two-state solution.

The subsequent Conservative government was energetic in how it reacted to the October 7 outbreak of fighting. By and large, however, its record in the region was increasingly sorry. It did not include the concept of normalisation in its Integrated Review, which outlines the government’s foreign and security policy. It was not even a bystander in the launch of the India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor last year, whereas Germany signed the launch memorandum.

Today, Tony Blair would not be able to recognise the UK’s demeanour over the Palestine-Israel issue. The former Labour prime minister wanted to make an impact by building trust on the ground and making incremental progress in bolstering the Palestinian Authority. Indeed, he ran something of an end game around the Foreign Office by appointing a personal envoy on the process.

He was also active at a time when the US slacked away. Following the collapse of the Camp David Accord, it was Mr Blair who provided the impetus for then US president George W Bush to issue the 2003 Roadmap for Peace.

When his successor, Gordon Brown, took over, he not only became the first UK prime minister to address the Knesset but was also a noted champion of the economic roadmap for Palestinian financial and business autonomy. It was a step towards proving that a Palestinian state could sustainably justify itself as an independent nation. Mr Brown was also a notable champion of the Annapolis Process. But his time in office was also marked by the rise of Iran’s threats to the region, not least when its president called for Israel to be wiped off the face of the map.

Mr Starmer will, in time, have an opportunity to lead on the issue because of the UK’s historic responsibilities and the pressures within his party for an active policy.

What is true about Mr Blair and Mr Brown is that they were able to hold together the party by taking a positive and internationally prominent role. For the most part, the policy was an important tool of party management. However, Mr Blair’s approach to the Lebanese offensive in 2006 was the moment his leadership ran out of road. Exhausted with the Labour membership, he was gone within a year.

A decade and a half later, the Labour bench retains deep expertise on Palestine and Israel. The realism allied with pragmatism that it has promised to bring to foreign policy means that Mr Starmer may be forced to deal with Donald Trump in the White House in ways that Mr Blair was tested by Mr Bush.

A poll released on Monday by the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change, the former leader’s think tank, in association with Zogby Research Services showed that even in the ravages of the current conflict, there is appetite for a fully functioning Palestinian government. Of those polled in Gaza, the biggest grouping (about 29 per cent) supported a Gazan administration of local representatives, with international oversight and linked to the Palestinian Authority.

Among all the Palestinians, there was strong agreement on the ground that reform in the PA is the only way forward, should a ceasefire come. In the West Bank, four fifths support moderate-to-deep reform if it is on the table. The respondents remain optimistic that the PA represents a future state in the making, with 69 per cent on average still backing it as the way forward.

The approach taken by Mr Starmer and Mr Lammy is not yet clear, but their government can reconcile the political and diplomatic importance of recognition with the deep engagement that would assist reforms to overcome the all-too-many reverses that Palestinians have suffered in recent years.