Using Somaliland to Block Palestinian Statehood Is Morally and Politically Wrong

[Deeq A.]

Gideon Sa’ar (left) and the President of Somaliland Administration Abdirahman M. Abdullahi at a press conference in Hargeisa earlier today.

Hargeisa (Comment) — The visit of Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar to Hargeisa, the administrative capital of Somaliland Administration, more than nine days after the State of Israel recognised the Somaliland Administration as a republic. In a statement to the media, Gideon Sa’ar said: “Unlike Palestine, Somaliland is not a virtual state. It is a functioning state.”

In this very same statement, Israel made it clear that Somaliland serves as a bulwark against a future Palestinian state. It is ironic that Somaliland, which has staked its case for secession on what it describes as genocide perpetrated by the Somali military regime between 1988 and 1991, would be aligned with a state accused of to have perpetrated genocide in Palestine.

The President of Somaliland Administration, Abdirahman Mohamed Abdullahi, is a Finnish citizen; Finland granted him asylum and subsequently citizenship. It is worth noting that in September 2025, the UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory issued a landmark 72-page report concluding that Israel has committed genocide in Gaza. Although Finland does not recognise the State of Palestine, it supports a two-state solution, a solution that the Government of Israel is working hard to undermine.

Why do Somaliland’s political elites allow President Abdirahman to tarnish the image of the Somaliland Administration by accepting recognition from Benjamin Netanyahu, who is accused of war crimes? The genocidal acts Israel has committed in Gaza have been documented in works such as When the World Sleeps by Francesca Albanese (the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967), The World After Gaza by Pankaj Mishra, and The Message by Ta-Nehisi Coates.

The UN Security Council, the European Union, the African Union and the Arab League have all rejected Israel’s recognition of the Somaliland Administration.

“International law is what countries agree to. Once people decide they don’t agree, there is no international law,” Kemi Badenoch, Leader of the Conservative Party, told BBC Radio 4 this week. President Abdirahman would be accepting this “might-is-right” interpretation of international law if he presumes that recognition by Israel could lead to the breakup of Somalia and a seat at the United Nations. The process through which new countries come into existence in Africa is not through the imposition of secession by a superpower or by a client state of a superpower.

For the Somaliland Administration to regain its reputation, political elites should distance themselves from this political project and from the claims made by Netanyahu and his cabinet, which deny Palestinians the right to have their own state coexisting peacefully with Israel. President Abdirahman will be remembered for succumbing to moral defeat at a time when courage demanded speaking out against the dehumanisation of Palestinians. A two-state solution remains the path to peace in Palestine.

© Puntland Post, 2026