Claire Chandler (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Hansard source

I'm sure that every member of the Senate shares a deep concern for every innocent civilian, both in Gaza and in Israel, whose life has been put at risk by the abhorrent, barbaric acts of evil perpetrated by Hamas. Every single loss of life of an innocent civilian is a tragedy. They are tragedies that one side is determined to avoid and the other side, being Hamas, is determined to maximise in pursuit of its evil goals and ideology. Hamas has murdered 1,300 Israeli citizens as well as citizens of a number of other countries, including Australia. They have raped women, they have killed babies and small children and they have taken 200 innocent Israelis hostage.

It is a real shame that, when Israelis are murdered, the Greens have to find the first opportunity they can to criticise and condemn Israel. It seems that, for a certain segment of the far left, the expectation is that Israel must sit by and be attacked by terrorists day in and day out. When one of those attacks breaks through Israel's defences and murders over a thousand Israelis, the far left can't even allow one day of mourning for the innocent victims before they jump up to say that Israel is to blame and condemn any military response by Israel to save its own people and bring the terrorists to justice. They suggest that Israel should leave its own citizens held hostage in Gaza to the mercy of a terrorist group which has no mercy and which seeks to eradicate Israel and all of its citizens.

This motion put up by the Greens today could have condemned Hamas. It could have called for Hamas to release all of the hostages that have been taken. It could have called for action by the international community to stop the Islamic Republic of Iran funding Hamas and Hezbollah to murder Jews. It could have condemned the IRI regime and all of its proxies, who have threatened all-out war against Israel, a threat which puts every civilian in the region in danger. But, no, the Greens have chosen to oppose one of the very few options Israel has on the table, one which may—hopefully—give it a chance to save the women, the young children and the elderly being held in horrific conditions by Hamas.

Nobody wants to see war—a ground war or any other kind of war—but what exactly do the Greens want Israel to do other than capitulate to Hamas and let them keep doing as they have done? As Australians, we desperately hope never to be in a situation where our government has to come up with a plan to rescue 200 of our citizens being held hostage by the most barbaric terrorist group on the planet. We certainly hope that we will never be in the situation of having several of the worst terrorist groups on earth on our border, repeatedly trying to fire rockets and kill our citizens however they can, but that is exactly the situation that Israel is currently in, while the far left in western countries pass judgement and condemn them, even while Israel mourns the worst attack on Jewish people since the Holocaust. I point out that the action that the Greens are condemning today hasn't actually happened yet.

For many days Israel has been issuing warnings to citizens of Gaza to move away from danger areas, but Hamas has been actively stopping civilians from moving to safer areas. Why doesn't this motion that we are debating here today oppose Hamas deliberately using civilians of Gaza as human shields, as they have done for years? Hamas is the occupier of Gaza. For as long as Hamas is protected and controls Gaza then the citizens of Gaza will never be safe or free. That's what this motion that we are discussing here today could have discussed. That is what the Greens could have found within themselves to discuss in this chamber today.

We in the coalition unequivocally must condemn the motion they have put up. We condemn the Greens shamelessly playing politics with the situation that is currently playing out in the Middle East.