Andrew Dickens: The issue of recognising Palestine as a state

So the big question of today is whether New Zealand should join other nations in recognising a Palestinian state. 

Now this is a much bigger question than it seems. For some it's easy - call Palestine a state and then they have a legal foothold to fight for some land I guess.

And in a way, we already have done that by calling publicly for a two state solution to the conflict in the Middle East.

But it's easy to confuse nations and states. 

States have a multi-layered definition. A state is a political and legal entity with sovereignty over a defined territory and population. It's focus is governance, law, and authority.

So many of those provisos are missing.

Obviously there is no defined territory. Or maybe there was, but it's been pretty much destroyed now.  

There is no authority that is recognised by most, with Hamas having lost the mandate in the eyes of many countries and the Palestinian Authority long since discredited. 

A state can easily be confused with a nation, which is a group of people who share common cultural elements such as language, ethnicity, history, or traditions.

Māori are a nation of people within New Zealand. Palestine can be a nation, but that doesn't mean land. 

And that's where the rubber really hits the road. It's hard to recognise a Palestinian State when there is no land for it to belong in.

Declaring a Palestinian State is therefore a piece of global virtue signalling. A stance with little of no practical application other than political pressure on Israel.

New Zealand and its Government has been accused of kicking the can down the road because it's going to consider it's position over the next month.

To be fair, we are. But this is a delicate move which on the outside seems so easy to many, but is full of pitfalls. 

And seems to be putting the horse before the cart when we don't know where this state would be in the world. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
So the big question facing us today is where the
New Zealand should join other nations and recognizing a Palestinian state, now,
this is a much bigger question than it seems. For
some it's easy labor and the Greens do it reflexively
without thinking. I think, call the Palestinians a state, and
there you go. You've got a legal foothold to fight
for some land. I guess is the way they're thinking.
And in a way, we've already done that by publicly

(00:21):
calling for a two state solution to the conflict in
the Middle East. But it's easy to confuse nations and states,
and the definition of state has many layers. A state
is a political and legal entity with sovereignty over a
defined territory and a define population, and its focus is governance,

(00:42):
law and authority. And we know in the Palestinian case
many of those provisos are missing. Obviously there's no defined territory,
or maybe there was, but it's been pretty much destroyed.
There is no authority that is recognized by most, with
Hamas having lost the mandate in the eyes of many
countries after war. They did that October, and the Palestinian
authority long since discredited. A state can easily be confused

(01:07):
with a nation, which is a group of people who
share common cultural elements like language or ethnicity, in history
or traditions, So you can say Maori are a nation
of people with a New Zealand Palestinians can be a nation.
But that doesn't mean land, and that's what you need
to be a state, and that is where the rubbert
really hits the road. It is hard to recognize a

(01:27):
Palestinian state when there is no land for it to belong. In.
Declaring a Palestinian state right now, though, would therefore be
a piece of global virtue, signaling a stance with little
or no practical application other than political pressure on Israel.
And so New Zealand and its government has now been
accused of kicking the can down the road because it's

(01:49):
going to consider its position over the next month. And
to be fair, we are kicking the can down the road.
But this is a delicate move which, as I've said already,
on the outside, seems so easy to many, but it's
still full of pitfalls and it seems to be putting
the horse before the cart when we don't know where
the state would be in the world. And here's the

(02:10):
big thing. Would declaring a state actually put any food
in Palestinian bellies? For more from Early Edition with Ryan Bridge,
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