Statehood is right of Palestinian people: China Daily editorial

Shortly before his trip to the Middle East on Wednesday, UK Foreign Secretary David Cameron told Arab ambassadors at a Westminster reception on Monday that the United Kingdom is mulling recognition of a Palestinian state so that Israelis and Palestinians can live side by side in separate countries.

Although that proposal was greeted by Husam Zomlot, head of the Palestinian mission in London, as a "historic" change, as the UK's recognition of a Palestinian state would be "a contribution to a peaceful solution rather than an outcome".

Yet Cameron set very strict prerequisites for the UK's recognition of a Palestinian state, which he said the UK would then seek to persuade its allies to support — Hamas releasing all hostages and agreement by Israel and Hamas to a peace-oriented cease-fire.

Neither of those will be any easier to realize just because the UK is calling for them. The two conflicting parties' hatred against each other has been allowed to fester for so long that it has become ingrained. The UK has played an ugly role in this process by indulging Israel's continuous encroachment on the living space of Palestinians starting from the war in 1948, which has resulted in about 5.9 million Palestinians being displaced from their homes over the years.

Even if the two requisite conditions were met, the future Palestinian state envisioned by the UK government, according to Cameron's remarks, would be nothing but a de facto proxy of the West. "We have a responsibility there because we should be starting to set out what a Palestinian state would look like, what it would comprise, how it would work".

Cameron and those like-minded Western politicians who are trying to hide their own agenda under their so-called two-state solution should be reminded that the real two-state solution the UN and the broad international community have agreed on is strictly stipulated. It envisions an independent State of Palestine alongside the State of Israel with their boundaries based on the 1967 lines and with East Jerusalem as the capital of the Palestinian state. The two should be equal with each other in every regard in international law. As an independent sovereign state, Palestine's sovereignty belongs to its people and no country has any legitimate power or right to dictate its internal affairs.

By implanting "authorities" recognized by the West, if not Israel, in the "Palestinian state" as Cameron seems to suggest, what the UK has essentially proposed will be a one-state reality akin to apartheid.

Currently, 139 of the 193 UN member states recognize Palestinian statehood. The Palestinian people have never compromised and will by no means sacrifice their statehood for the recognition of the UK and its allies. Statehood is what the Palestinians are entitled to and what is long overdue. It is not a gift that can be condescendingly given by any country.