Diário de Notícias
Opinion
Victor Ângelo
International Security Advisor. Former UN Under-Secretary-General
Published on: 02 Oct 2026
Portuguese foreign policy has a habit of waiting. It waits for Washington, Brussels, Paris, or Berlin to decide what is to be praised, what is to be condemned, and what is to be passed over in silence. In September 2025, by recognizing the State of Palestine, Lisbon demonstrated that it can decide on its own. This now remains to be confirmed. King Abdullah II’s speech at the 81st United Nations General Assembly on 22 September 2026 provides the occasion.
Diplomacy prefers ambiguity. The King rejected it. For decades, the King stated, the international community has managed the Israeli-Palestinian conflict rather than resolving it, treating every violation as temporary until the temporary became permanent, and the permanent was converted into policy. For him, Gaza and the West Bank are two fronts of a single Israeli strategy: making a Palestinian State unviable. In Gaza, the destruction aims to erase Palestinian life. In the West Bank, settlements, land appropriation, demolitions, and expulsions have become a political objective.
He recalled that the 2002 Arab Peace Initiative remains valid: normalization in exchange for peace and a Palestinian State. He denounced the use of humanitarian aid as an instrument of pressure, and warned that the weakening of multilateral institutions threatens the security of all. Inaction, he said, is a choice, because there are sanctions, asset freezes, and diplomatic isolation, which have already been applied in other cases. He pointed to Israel's "expansionist appetite" and cited Syria as a warning: repeated incursions and faits accomplis, including around vital water resources.
The essence of the speech is rooted in international law. The forced transfer of populations is prohibited by the Fourth Geneva Convention and constitutes a war crime under the Rome Statute. The acquisition of foreign territory by force violates the United Nations Charter. Security Council Resolution 2334 (2016) declared the settlements to have no legal validity. In July 2024, the International Court of Justice concluded that the Israeli presence in the occupied territories is illegal, and that States must refrain from supporting it. The Security Council enshrined the two-state solution in 2002.
Portugal does not possess the colonial past in the Middle East of the great powers. It has centuries of contact with Islam, in its language, tilework, and toponymy, alongside longstanding relations with the Islamic cultures of Africa, the Indian Ocean, and Asia. It can serve as a bridge, provided it does so with States that respect international law. Moreover, Portugal has a direct interest: the stability of the Mediterranean has a decisive bearing on migration, energy, and the security of Europe's southern flank.
Jordan is a stable interlocutor, hosts a vast population of Palestinian refugees, and acts as the custodian of the Islamic holy sites in Jerusalem. It is not a democracy, and nobody needs to pretend that it is. In foreign policy, however, it meets the criteria of the rule of law and multilateralism better than some habitual partners.
Consistency will be put to the test when Portugal takes its seat on the Security Council in 2027 and 2028. Two years of votes, declarations, and abstentions will be placed on record. It will fall to the Government to conduct foreign policy. The Council of State, the consultative body to the President of the Republic, must be called upon to offer its opinion on the broad outlines of Portuguese participation in the most sensitive matters. In the Assembly of the Republic, the Committee on Foreign Affairs and Portuguese Communities will scrutinize the positions adopted, ensuring that the mandate on the Security Council is not reduced to an uncritical alignment with other governments.
For now, I propose three gestures, in ascending order of demand.
The first is to invite King Abdullah II for an official visit in the coming months. The last visit to Lisbon by the Jordanian monarchy was in March 2009. The invitation is the prerogative of the President of the Republic, in consultation with the Government. Made now, upon entering the Security Council, it signals to the world whom Portugal wishes to speak with, and what it considers to be a priority. In May, Minister Paulo Rangel told his Jordanian counterpart that the two countries share a very similar political vision. An invitation to the King would lend this convergence the seal of the State.
The second is to propose that Jordan join the CPLP (Community of Portuguese Language Countries) as an associate observer, a status already held by Qatar. The decision rests with the Community, but the initiative can originate in Lisbon. A prominent Arab State would connect the CPLP to the Islamic world, within a Lusophone sphere that includes relevant Muslim communities, such as those in Mozambique and Guinea-Bissau.
The third is to move the two-state solution from rhetoric to action. In Brussels, Portugal must advocate for effective conditionalities against those who render it unviable in reality. In European practice, the word sanction remains a taboo when the recipient is Israel: the Union affirms a principle on paper and tolerates its opposite on the ground, even when faced with a Head of Government sought by the International Criminal Court. In New York, Portugal must keep the issue on the agenda and vote according to the law, not according to a bloc reflex.
Jordan has limitations, regime interests, and dependencies, and no serious analysis ignores them. Yet, a speech that names the facts, invokes the precise legal instruments, and links Palestine to regional security provides Portugal with an anchor that Western ambiguity has ceased to offer.
If Portugal limits itself to being a predictable vote, aligned by reflex and silent out of convenience, the recognition of 2025 will remain an isolated episode. The King recalled that attention is a geopolitical resource, and that the world chooses where to focus it. Whoever is to sit on the Security Council for two years cannot pretend not to have heard the speech.
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