France plans to formally recognize a Palestinian state at the United Nations General Assembly this week – following similar statements made by the UK, Canada and Australia over the weekend. This step brings major Western powers into alignment with the close to 150 countries that already recognize Palestine — yet further from the US, which is now the only permanent member of the UN Security Council that doesn’t.
Last week, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio called statehood recognition “counter-productive” because it emboldens Hamas, an Iran-backed group designated as a terrorist organization by the US and European Union. Charles Kushner, the US ambassador to France, criticized Macron’s initiative on X, and last month accused the government of not acting sufficiently against anti-semitism.