LONDON: The UK’s foreign secretary accused Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of allowing children to starve in Gaza as she explained Britain’s decision to recognize a Palestinian state.
Speaking at a landmark UN conference co-hosted by Saudi Arabia and France, Yvette Cooper pointed to Israel’s atrocities in Gaza as a key reason why the UK had made the declaration.
Britain is among at least 10 other Western nations to have recognized Palestine in recent days in response to Israel’s war in Gaza that has killed more than 65,000 people.
Cooper said statehood is the “inalienable right of the Palestinian people” and that two states is the only path to “security and lasting peace for Israelis and Palestinians.”
She said Britain’s decision reflected “a grave reality” with the road map to a lasting peace with a Palestinian and Israeli state side by side “in profound peril.”
