Mark Furner (Queensland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

That is right. On the way into a supermarket, I was scanned by a security guard with a machine gun strapped over his shoulder. No doubt this is stopping suicide bombers. It is stopping people being murdered as they drive their vehicles along the highways in Israel.

Something that brought home to me the courtesy and consideration that the Israeli people provide other people throughout the world was the Save a Child's Heart organisation run by Simon Fisher at Wolfson Medical Centre. This is an amazing initiative in which an Israeli based international humanitarian project provides life-saving cardiac surgery and other critical procedures for children from developing countries like Indonesia and from regions such as Africa, the Americas, Eastern Europe and Asia. For locations close to Israel, like the West Bank, Gaza, Jordan and Iraq, Israel in fact provides 49 per cent of medical procedures for children. While visiting the hospital I saw a young child, sedated following an operation, lying in bed next to her mother. The child had came from Gaza for a heart operation, an operation that this child would never have received had it not been for Save a Child's Heart or for the help of the Israeli government.    In addition to the medical treatment provided to date to over 2,700 children from 42 countries, the project provides a comprehensive training program in Israel for doctors from these countries. While we were present it was explained that a doctor from Tanzania was, after eight years of training, returning to their country to be the sole cardio practitioner able to treat children with heart problems. Yad Vashem The Holocaust Martyrs and Heroes Remembrance Authority is another stark reminder of what happened to this country and reminds us what happened in history. The main display in the complex is the historical museum, which tells the story of the Holocaust in chronological order, beginning with Adolf Hitler and his rise to power in 1933, the persecution of the Jews through to the final stage of the awful genocide of the Holocaust. The authority commemorates the six million Jews murdered by the Nazis and their collaborators. I think anyone would be moved by the displays and material describing the systematic persecution and murders of the Jews as delivered by the chronicles and displays throughout the museum. At the very end of the museum is provided a register of the names of the millions of Jews killed, along with the children's memorial commemorating 1½ million children who died during the Holocaust.

Notwithstanding the numerous examples of this terrible piece of history, one part stuck in my mind, consistent with contemporary activities occurring in Melbourne and Brisbane—that is, the boycotting of Jewish businesses. History tells us that Saturday, 1 April 1933 was the start of anti-Semitic attacks on the Jewish population. Nazi Brownshirt troopers stood at entrances to Jewish shops, department stores and professional offices holding posters saying 'Germans, defend yourselves against the Jewish atrocity propaganda, buy only at German shops.' These events led to series of laws and decrees robbing the Jews of one right after another within the 12 years of Hitler's Reich, with 400 laws and decrees targeting the Jews.

As most of us would be aware, there exists today events where Jewish businesses have been boycotted for no apparent reason. In the Melbourne CBD on 1 July this year this action resulted in 19 arrests after anti-Israel protesters blocked potential customers from entering the Max Brenner chocolate and coffee store. If you go to YouTube and search for these particular protests you will see examples and footage of these boycotts and you will see firsthand protesters holding up signs like 'Israel: the Mother of Terrorism', and shouting out over loudhailers, 'We're going to shut you down Max Brenner'. As a result of these bigoted protests the Max Brenner store was forced to close for the duration of the protest. The correlation between the two events should not be lost; anyone associated with them, whether individuals or political parties, like Greens Senator Rhiannon, who was in here before, should be condemned on the basis of their association of these activities. I know she has been supporting these events, and it is something she really needs to take stock of and realise the effect it is having on a business that has nothing to do with what is occurring in Israel.

The Palestinian Media Watch is another example of what is happening over there. It is an Israeli research institute that studies Palestinian society from a broad range of perspectives by monitoring and analysing the Palestinian Authority through its media and schoolbooks. PMW's major focus is on the messages that the Palestinian leaders, from the Palestinian Authority, Fatah and Hamas, send to the population through the broad range of institutions and infrastructures they control. PMW's many reports and studies on Palestinian summer camps, poetry, schoolbooks, crossword puzzles, religious ideology, women and mothers, children's music videos and the PA's indoctrination of adults and children to seek shahada—or martyrdom—have had significant impact on the way the world sees the Palestinians. PMW has presented its findings before members of US congress and to members of parliament in numerous countries including the European Union, Britain, France, Norway, Sweden, Holland, Switzerland, Canada and Australia, and has lectured at universities and conferences worldwide.

PMW's material has been presented before the foreign affairs committee in the US congress and the US senate appropriations committee. In addition, PMW reports regularly on how foreign aid is misused by the PA for terror promotion. These reports have led to changes in legislation and funding procedures. Through its bulletins and reports PMW continues to give the world a precise understanding of the reality of the Palestinian Authority. Disturbing examples of propaganda delivered over television by Hamas is this following set of words in a video clip, entitled 'Hamas: Kill Christians and Jews "to the last one"'. It reads as follows:

Allah, oh our Lord, vanquish Your enemies, enemies of the religion [Islam] in all places.

Allah, strike the Jews and their sympathizers,

the Christians and their supporters,

the Communists and their adherents.

Allah, count them and kill them to the last one, and don't leave even one.

That is just one example of what the PMW has been able to provide and show the world of the propaganda that is being delivered through Hamas and others associated with terrorist acts. I will never understand how anyone is able to advocate the theft of a child's innocence through systematic brainwashing in their very early age of adolescence by planting the seeds of terrorism in their minds.

Another opportunity arose while in Bethlehem to visit a Palestinian refugee camp. I am running out of time, but I will try and get through this. It really was a great opportunity in Bethlehem to visit one of these camps. While having some preconceived ideas of these types of camps from media images, I was quite surprised to see the opposite. Despite being reasonably quiet walking through the streets of the camp, the silence was shortly broken by the sound of children returning home from school, playing and laughing, enjoying their journey homeward. In addition, we had an opportunity to purchase some light refreshments at a corner store.

In conclusion, I left Israel slightly pessimistic of a solution ever being reached. As in a previous life, where for 20 years I was involved in negotiations of all sorts, I know that, to reach agreement on any matter, there needs to be genuine negotiations and compromise. Without this approach any conclusion to reach a settlement will fail. (Time expired)