Australia Reverses Recognition of Jerusalem as Israeli Capital

Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong speaks during a news conference on the sidelines of the 77th United Nations General Assembly at UN headquarters in New York City, New York, US, September 20, 2022. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid/File Photo
Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong speaks during a news conference on the sidelines of the 77th United Nations General Assembly at UN headquarters in New York City, New York, US, September 20, 2022. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid/File Photo
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Australia Reverses Recognition of Jerusalem as Israeli Capital

Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong speaks during a news conference on the sidelines of the 77th United Nations General Assembly at UN headquarters in New York City, New York, US, September 20, 2022. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid/File Photo
Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong speaks during a news conference on the sidelines of the 77th United Nations General Assembly at UN headquarters in New York City, New York, US, September 20, 2022. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid/File Photo

Australia said Tuesday it would no longer recognize West Jerusalem as Israel's capital, reversing a contentious decision by the previous conservative government.

Foreign Minister Penny Wong said the city's status should be decided through peace talks between Israelis and Palestinians, and not through unilateral decisions, reported AFP.

"We will not support an approach that undermines" a two-state solution, she said, adding: "Australia's embassy has always been, and remains, in Tel Aviv".

In 2018 a conservative government led by Scott Morrison followed former US president Donald Trump's lead in naming West Jerusalem as the Israeli capital.

The move caused a domestic backlash in Australia and caused friction with neighboring Indonesia -- the world's most populous Muslim-majority nation -- temporarily derailing a free trade deal.

Jerusalem is claimed by both Israelis and Palestinians, and most foreign governments avoid formally declaring it the capital of any state.

"I know this has caused conflict and distress in part of the Australian community, and today the government seeks to resolve that," Wong said.

She accused the Morrison government of being motivated by a by-election in a beach-side Sydney suburb with a sizable Jewish community.

"You know what this was? This was a cynical play, unsuccessful, to win the seat of Wentworth and a by-election."
The center-left Labor party, with Anthony Albanese as prime minister and Wong as foreign minister, came to power in May 2022.

Wong insisted that the decision did not signal any hostility to Israel.

"Australia will always be a steadfast friend of Israel. We were amongst the first countries to formally recognize Israel," she said.

"We will not waver in our support of Israel and the Jewish community in Australia. We are equally unwavering in our support of the Palestinian people, including humanitarian support."

Israel occupied Arab east Jerusalem in the 1967 Six Day War and later annexed it, declaring the entire city its "eternal and indivisible capital".

Palestinians claim the eastern part as the capital of a future Palestinian state.

- Symbolism -Canberra's decision is unlikely to come as a shock to the Israeli government.

The policy reversal was foreshadowed by the removal of language on the Israeli capital on the website of Australia's Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade.

But it will likely cause unease, according to Ran Porat, a historian and researcher at Melbourne's Monash University.

Even though Australia is not a major player in peace talks, he said: "In the Middle East in general symbolism is very much at the center of many conflicts. Symbolism is not negligible, it's not unimportant."

The move could be seized on Israel's opposition Likud, led by Benjamin Netanyahu as evidence of the government's failings ahead of November 1 elections.

Prime Minister Yair Lapid will be disappointed, Porat added, but the response "has to be walking between the disagreement and not souring relations with Canberra."



Israeli Fire Kills 30 in Gaza, Medics Say, as Attention Shifts to Iran 

Palestinians carry sacks and boxes of food and humanitarian aid unloaded from a World Food Program convoy that had been heading to Gaza City, in the northern Gaza Strip, Monday, June 16, 2025. (AP)
Palestinians carry sacks and boxes of food and humanitarian aid unloaded from a World Food Program convoy that had been heading to Gaza City, in the northern Gaza Strip, Monday, June 16, 2025. (AP)
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Israeli Fire Kills 30 in Gaza, Medics Say, as Attention Shifts to Iran 

Palestinians carry sacks and boxes of food and humanitarian aid unloaded from a World Food Program convoy that had been heading to Gaza City, in the northern Gaza Strip, Monday, June 16, 2025. (AP)
Palestinians carry sacks and boxes of food and humanitarian aid unloaded from a World Food Program convoy that had been heading to Gaza City, in the northern Gaza Strip, Monday, June 16, 2025. (AP)

Israeli gunfire and strikes killed at least 30 people across the Gaza Strip on Wednesday, local health authorities said, as some Palestinians there said their plight was being forgotten as attention shifted to the air war between Israel and Iran.

The deaths included the latest in near daily killings of Palestinians seeking aid in the three weeks since Israel partially lifted a total blockade on Gaza that it had imposed for almost three months.

Medics said separate airstrikes on homes in the Maghazi refugee camp and Zeitoun neighborhood in central and northern Gaza killed at least 14 people, while five others were killed in an airstrike on a tent encampment in Khan Younis in southern Gaza.

Eleven others were killed in Israeli fire at crowds of displaced Palestinians awaiting aid trucks brought in by the United Nations along the Salahuddin road in central Gaza, medics said.

The Israel army said it was looking into the reported deaths of people waiting for food. Regarding the other strikes, it said it was "operating to dismantle Hamas military capabilities" and "feasible precautions to mitigate civilian harm."

On Tuesday, Gaza's health ministry said 397 Palestinians among those trying to get food aid had been killed and more than 3,000 wounded since aid deliveries restarted in late May.

Some in Gaza expressed concern that the latest escalations in the war between Israel and Hamas that began in October 2023 would be overlooked as the focus moved to Israel's five-day-old conflict with Iran.

"People are being slaughtered in Gaza, day and night, but attention has shifted to the Iran-Israel war. There is little news about Gaza these days," said Adel, a resident of Gaza City.

"Whoever doesn't die from Israeli bombs dies from hunger. People risk their lives every day to get food, and they also get killed and their blood smears the sacks of flour they thought they had won," he told Reuters via a chat app.

'FORGOTTEN'

Israel has been channeling much of the aid it is now allowing into Gaza through a new US- and Israeli-backed group, the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, which operates a handful of distribution sites in areas guarded by Israeli forces.

It has said it will continue to allow aid into Gaza, home to more than 2 million people, while ensuring aid doesn't get into the hands of Hamas. Hamas denies seizing aid, saying Israel uses hunger as a weapon against the population in Gaza.

The Gaza war was triggered when Hamas-led fighters attacked Israel in October 2023, killing 1,200 and taking about 250 hostages, according to Israeli allies.

US ally Israel's subsequent military assault on Gaza has killed nearly 55,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza's health ministry, displaced almost all the territory's residents, and caused a severe hunger crisis.

The assault has led to accusations of genocide and war crimes, which Israel denies.

Palestinians in Gaza have been closely following Israel's air war with Iran, long a major supporter of Hamas.

"We are maybe happy to see Israel suffer from Iranian rockets, but at the end of the day, one more day in this war costs the lives of tens of innocent people," said 47-year-old Shaban Abed, a father of five from northern Gaza.

"We just hope that a comprehensive solution could be reached to end the war in Gaza, too. We are being forgotten," he said.