David Shoebridge (NSW, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

For more than a year now the world has been watching the horror in these images of violence, destruction and death to the people in the region of Israel, Gaza and Lebanon. That violence degrades us and degrades our common humanity. Every day it continues, every day our government fails to do everything in its power to end it, is one more day where a mum loses a son, a husband loses a wife, a child loses a friend and communities see their neighbours, their work colleagues, their history, their community being killed. In these moments you can lose faith in the human project, when you see this continue with impunity.

But I'm heartened by the millions of people around the world who are calling for an end to this violence, who gather in places like, this morning, outside parliament and in my hometown of Sydney each weekend. They gather and they come together to find some solace by sharing common values of peace and by knowing that there can be a better world where our governments condemn this violence. And they match those words with actions.

When I was at the rally in Sydney on Sunday, what struck me was this common understanding amongst the thousands and thousands of Sydneysiders that everyone, whether they have live in the Middle East or in Hurstville, is as important as each other. I saw a commitment to respect that and to force this government to not deny those same rights to the people who may have fled the conflict in Palestine or Lebanon or who may be trying to survive this appalling conflict in Palestine or Lebanon.

This government is treating some lives as more important than others, some societies as worthy of protection and concern and some as not. You can see that both Labor and the coalition have adopted a two-tiered political approach in this awful conflict. Nowhere is it clearer than in how this government has treated refugees and people seeking asylum who have been fleeing conflicts in the last few years. What we should be doing as a society is treating people equally and fairly. When people need to flee violence and come to our country for safety or protection—and look to us as a nation ruled by law based on principles, that commits to international conventions on refugees and on the rights of the child—they should look to our government to treat people equally. But that has not happened.

When we look upon the thousands who have been fleeing this conflict, you can see how this government, with the active support of the coalition, has been grading and rating and doling out rights based not on principle, but based on some appalling political values of people's lives.

The Albanese government have shown that they are unwilling to put pressure on the Israeli government to stop the genocide and the occupation of Palestine, despite the UN and the International Court of Justice making it clear that all countries should be introducing sanctions to stop the occupation and should be introducing clear resolutions to end the two-way trade of military equipment. The Albanese government have chosen to ignore international and—worse still—to gaslight this chamber and the Australian community by denying the obvious, denying that we are supplying weapons parts such as for the F-35 fighter jets that are delivering the bombs, the misery, and the killing in Gaza and, more recently, in Lebanon. They have chosen to deny this, to stand in this chamber and deny the truth and the reality and to ignore international law

What's behind that, the unquestioning commitment to doing whatever the US asks of us? At the moment, the US wants us to back in their actions, the provision of some $22 billion of military aid, bombs and weapons from the United States to Israel. They want us to unquestionably back that in and do our little bit in the supply chain of providing the weapons and the support for the ongoing genocide in Gaza, for the invasion of Lebanon and for the bombing of every neighbouring country that Israel feels it's entitled to bomb. We have just lined up behind the US with this unquestioning subservience. It has diminished our country, it has diminished this government and it has treated people with utter contempt and disrespect.

Even though the Albanese government has decided to fall in with the United States and ignore the vast majority of the world on this issue, surely—surely—this government could treat the people who came here and fled this conflict, like other conflicts, with equality, respect and compassion. But even that hasn't happened. After a year of torment, this government still refuses to offer a fair and genuine safe haven. Out of the more than 10,000 people in Palestine who applied for protection, not quite 3,000 had their visas granted. More than 7,000 had their visa applications rejected. For some comparison, we can look at what happened in the conflict in Ukraine, in the opening 12 months of that appalling conflict. The government did the right thing then. In fact, in just the first few months the former government issued some 5,000 visas for people to flee the conflict and have refuge in Australia. Less than five were rejected. In Palestine, 10,000 applied, and more than 7,000 were rejected. Barely 3,000, not quite 3,000, were approved. In Ukraine, 5,000 applied, and 5,000 were approved—fewer than five were rejected.

Let's look at another example, one closer to this conflict. In that same time since the start of this appalling conflict, there have been 9,865 visas granted to Israeli citizens to come to Australia, and barely 250 have been rejected. Let that sink in for a moment. Nearly the exact same number of people have applied to come to Australia from Palestine as from Israel, and more than 70 per cent from Palestine were rejected, and the rejection numbers from Israel are so small as to be almost statistically unrecognisable. You could not have a clearer description than that of an openly discriminatory regime.

For people who are in Gaza and are fleeing the conflict, seven in 10 of those applications are rejected. When almost every application is approved for people who are in many cases fleeing the same conflict from the other side of the border, in Israel, how do you think that looks to the families of Palestinians here? Why are so many people from Palestine being treated so differently and harshly? Part of the reason is that people fleeing the conflict from Palestine were told by the Albanese government they could only apply for a tourist visa. And then the government turns around and rejects Palestinians fleeing the conflict in Gaza—the destruction of their home, the destruction of their community, the bombing of their school, the destruction of their university, the bombing of their neighbourhood, the lack of water. The Albanese government rejects the tourist visa applications that it told them to make because it says they're not legitimately tourists, they're not coming here to visit the opera house, they're coming here to flee a conflict, a genocidal conflict, and they may not want to return to a genocidal conflict in Gaza. And they're being refused for that reason. It is Orwellian; it is obscene.

Do you know what makes it worse? They're still charging Palestinians in Gaza to apply for the visa. Right now, for the visa that's rejected seven times in 10, the Australian government is charging Palestinians—with no money, no job, no water, no food and no home—$200 for the privilege of having their claim rejected, because it says they're not tourists. They've taken more than $2 million in visa application fees from Palestinians. That's the same amount the government offered to the Red Cross to try and assist Palestinians in the country. Basically, Palestinians fleeing, or seeking to flee, have paid the government $2 million that the government then repurposed for the Red Cross, for Palestinians in Australia. It is beyond appalling.

For those 3,000 visas that were granted, the government has done little if anything to assist people or to work with Israel, to work with Egypt, to get people out of Gaza. Barely 1,300 have managed to even arrive, of the 3,000 visas that were granted. The majority of those who were granted a visa are still trapped in Gaza, being told tonight, again, to move to another place because where they are will be the subject of yet another round of bombings—bombs made in the United States, our ally; bombs delivered by an F-35, whose bomb bay doors only open because of parts made in Australia. They're trapped in Gaza.

When people who fled the Ukraine conflict arrived here, they were provided immediately with a visa that gave them access to work rights, to study rights, to support, to English language support and to the tools that are needed to help heal and rebuild—and of course they should have been. They were fleeing an appalling war, an invasion of their land. The people from Palestine fleeing the occupation and invasion of their land have none of that—nothing. They're stuck on visas that prevent them from working, studying or accessing basic support—no English support, no income support. When those visas run out they're moved onto a punitive bridging visa where they're kept in endless limbo. No-one is able to apply for a permanent visa, and no-one has certainty about their future.

I've been lucky enough to meet with some of those who have fled Palestine, and they are incredibly grateful for the chance to be somewhere safe and incredibly grateful that their kids are not being exposed to bombs and killing. What they have said about the conflict and the horrors they've faced is chilling. After escaping airstrikes and paying tens of thousands of dollars, sometimes, just to get across the border and access the right to leave from Egypt, they arrive here and they're given nothing. I met with one couple who had three young kids. One of the kids was in preschool, but, because of uncertainty about her visa, the preschool said she couldn't attend. Think about that. We're in a country that's stopping children from going to school because our visa system is pointlessly harsh, punitive and uncaring. Who makes this up?

We're now hearing that Minister Burke is providing people with humanitarian visas, but I'll quote him here:

I've been dealing with some of the Palestinians on visitor visas who are here in Australia—some on visitor visas, some on bridging visas—and for some of the people who I've been meeting with, I've been transferring them on to humanitarian visas.

So is that what it's come to? You need an audience with Lord Burke, the minister, before you'll be granted the most basic humanitarian visa? Is there some sort of power play here where it's only if a Palestinian family are fortunate enough to get an audience with the minister that he may deign to give them a humanitarian visa? What of the 1,000-plus others who can't have that access and won't get the audience with Lord Burke? What of them? Just nothing?

We cannot, as a country, unilaterally end the horrible violence. We should, of course, be doing more and not be complicit in the violence, but we can't, as an individual country, end the horrors and the violence. But, for the 1,300 Palestinians who have come here, it is entirely within our power to grant them permanent protections. We can give them the right to work. We can give them a permanent visa. We can stop this pointless cruelty. That is within our power, and, 12 months on, this miserable government refuses to do even that. What is wrong with the Labor Party, and what is wrong with the coalition, who've doubled down on their cruelty to Palestinians who've finally found some refuge here?