Albanese gives away Australia’s only leverage to promote peace in Palestine

So it’s timely to assess, as I sought to do in Senate estimates last week, how Palestinian recognition is working in practice.

Foreign Minister Penny Wong promised Australians that recognising Palestine came with five firm conditions: reforming governance, ending prisoner payments for convicted terrorists, instituting schooling reform, demilitarising and holding elections.

Last Wednesday at Senate estimates, I asked Senator Wong and her department some basic questions about progress on these conditions.

When asked about governance reform, officials said they could not say and would have to take the question on notice. Not confidence inspiring.

The US and Western countries have rightly demanded the end of prisoner payments for terrorists. Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas has claimed the payments have been halted and commissioned global firm Alvarez & Marsal to verify this.

Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) officials pointed to this report as evidence of progress.

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Senator Wong washed her hands of the issue, saying, “We’re relying on what an American entity has ascertained.”

There’s just one problem.

On 19 July 2026, the US State Department dismissed the Alvarez & Marsal report, accusing the PA of setting up “clandestine bypass channels” to continue the payments, while trying to “dupe” the international community into believing it had ended the system.

When asked if Palestinian schools still used textbooks depicting Jews as evil and inciting terrorism, Senator Wong’s officials said: “It’s our assessment that there are very few instances of that.”

You might think that “very few” is still far too much when it comes to brainwashing children into anti-Semitism and glorifying terrorism.

A fundamental basis for statehood is whether you can prevent organised armed violence by groups within your borders.

If Hamas remains armed and capable of spoiling progress, as they have for decades, Palestine can be no more than a failed state, with any attempt at lasting peace between Israel and the PA doomed to fail.

When asked about progress towards demilitarisation, DFAT officials told the Senate: “That is a work in progress ... but it is obviously a challenge because of the Hamas factor.”

The United States is seeking demilitarisation before even considering recognition of Palestinian statehood.

Australia has done the opposite.

President Abbas is now 21 years into his first four-year term. Last month, he again cancelled elections that were supposed to be held in November. When asked about the cancelled elections last week, Senator Wong said Australia had expressed “disappointment”. Her officials clarified that they had actually expressed “deep disappointment”.

Of the five “preconditions” Australia announced in exchange for Palestinian recognition, one year on progress is not looking good.

We could charitably say there has been partial progress on two – schooling and pay for slay. Zero progress on two – governance and militarisation. And we’ve actually gone backwards on perhaps the most important – democratic elections.

Surely given this dismal failure to meet our preconditions of recognition, the Albanese government must now be considering withdrawing our premature diplomatic move?

But when I asked Senator Wong if the government would ever consider revoking recognition, her response was an emphatic: “No, we have recognised the state of Palestine.”

The PA has already got from Australia what they wanted.

The Albanese government has given away the only leverage we had to encourage the PA to clean up its act. And one year on, we are no closer to peace than we were before.

The above opinion-editorial was provided by the Office of Senator James Paterson, shadow minister for defence and previously published in the Daily Telegraph.