Eight Western nations formally recognized a state of Palestine on Sunday and Monday, as the United Nations General Assembly convened in New York. Due to stalwart U.S. opposition, the symbolic move will have little effect beyond distracting the U.N. from determining more serious matters, according to experts. “The whole thing is irrelevant, and it’s almost a vanity project for a couple of these world leaders who want to be relevant,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Tuesday. “But it really makes no difference.”

On Sunday, the U.K., Canada, Australia, and Portugal followed through on their commitments from earlier this year to recognize Palestinian statehood before the U.N. convention. On Monday, France, Belgium, Monaco, and Luxembourg did the same.

“This is not a new initiative,” said Dr. Jonathan Schanzer, executive director at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, on “Washington Watch.” “This is something that has actually been pursued by the Palestinian Authority since 2005. There was actually a vote in 2012 where the U.N. saw 138 countries come out and recognize the State of Palestine, or what they call the State of Palestine.”

In a U.N. General Assembly vote earlier this month, some 142 countries voted to implement a two-state solution, while only 10 nations (including the U.S. and Israel) voted against.

Yet even that overwhelming show of global support “didn’t do anything to further the cause,” Schanzer pointed out. “The reason why is that this will only matter if it is voted upon and accepted at the U.N. Security Council. So, a General Assembly vote where 193 countries could all vote in favor wouldn’t matter, not even a bit. It has to be at the Security Council, and that’s where the United States has a veto.”

A major argument against establishing a Palestine among the nations of the world is that it fails to meet the definition of a state, he continued. “It’s not just that they don’t have a constitution. It’s not just that they don’t have defined boundaries. They don’t control [the] arms within their so-called borders. In other words, there are armed gangs that are running around in both the West Bank and the Gaza Strip,” Schanzer exclaimed. “The only thing that they are able to do that would meet the criteria of statehood is engage in diplomacy. So, one out of four [criteria] — not looking real good for the Palestinians here.”

Another argument against Palestinian statehood, which American diplomats have stressed, is the timing of the recognition, coming after Hamas’s October 7 terror attack, but before any comprehensive peace deal to end the conflict. “The U.S. position on this, that they feel that this is rewarding Hamas — I mean, I don’t know how you see it any different,” declared FRC President Tony Perkins. “On October 7th, they brutalized, they killed. And now we’re rewarding them. The international community would be rewarding them with a state.”

“I think it is a green light for violent factions and Kurdistan, for example … and other areas where you have people without a homeland,” Schanzer agreed. “This is the kind of thing where you just scratch your head and wonder, why wouldn’t they offer statehood after an agreement is struck, after the hostages are returned, after the core components of this conflict, are resolved?”

Taking the U.K. for instance, Perkins pointed out that, “back in July,” Prime Minister Keir Starmer “laid out conditions, one of those being that Hamas would have to release the hostages. They would disarm [and have] no future role in Gaza. None of those conditions have been agreed to or met. But yet he’s now calling for recognition of a Palestinian state.”

President Donald Trump stressed this point in his Tuesday address before the U.N. General Assembly, “Now, as if to encourage continued conflict, some of this body is seeking to unilaterally recognize a Palestinian state. The rewards would be too great for Hamas terrorists for their atrocities. This would be a reward for these horrible atrocities, including October 7th, even while they refuse to release the hostages or accept a ceasefire.”

Schanzer contended that Western leaders recognizing Palestine are simply staging political theater on the world stage, at Israel’s expense, because they need to capture the “genocide vote” at home. “Most of these world leaders that are declaring Palestinian statehood are deeply unpopular at home,” he noted. “You see the government in France teetering. Keir Starmer’s numbers in England are plummeting. The Portuguese are traditionally just unstable. … And they have large Muslim populations who have been speaking out against the war in Gaza.”

However, “in the end, it will matter very little,” Schanzer concluded. “There will be some political pressure that will be placed on Israel as a result of this. But the U.S. has Israel’s back, and I think the pressure will at some point dissipate.”

Rubio made many of the same points in a recent interview. “There is no Palestinian State, no matter how many papers they put out, and the only time there will ever be one is if there’s a negotiation with Israel, which right now is impossible because they have a war going on with Hamas, a terrorist group that butchered over 2,000 people on October 7th,” he said. “Actually, the impact … is that it actually derailed … the talks that were going on, made it even harder to get Hamas to enter into concessions that might have brought this to an end.”

“Donald Trump is not going to be swayed,” Schanzer concluded. “So this is posturing. It’s a lot of virtue-signaling right now, and there is much more important business to attend to at the United Nations. We’ve got a war with Russia and Ukraine. You’ve got snapback sanctions against Iran. These are the things that we should be focused on, not something that we know that’s not going to pass.”