Penny Wong (SA, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That the Senate—

(a) reiterates its unequivocal condemnation of Hamas' terror attacks on Israel which took place on 7 October 2023, in which more than 1,200 innocent Israelis were killed, the largest loss of Jewish life on any single day since the Holocaust;

(b) recognises that hundreds more innocent people were subjected to brutality and violence on that day;

(c) calls for the immediate and unconditional release of all remaining hostages;

(d) condemns the murder of hostages and the inhumane conditions and violence, including sexual violence, that hostages have experienced;

(e) mourns with all impacted by these heinous acts;

(f) condemns antisemitism in all its forms and stands with Jewish Australians who have felt the cold shadows of antisemitism reaching into the present day;

(g) reiterates Australia's consistent position to call for the protection of civilian lives and adherence to international law;

(h) mourns the death of all innocent civilians, recognising the number of Palestinian civilians killed in Gaza, and the catastrophic humanitarian situation;

(i) supports ongoing international efforts to provide humanitarian assistance in Gaza and Lebanon;

(j) calls for Iran to cease its destabilising actions, including through terrorist organisations the Houthis, Hezbollah and Hamas, condemns Iran's attacks on Israel and recognises Israel's right to defend itself against these attacks;

(k) stresses the need to break the cycle of violence and supports international efforts to de-escalate, for a ceasefire in Gaza and in Lebanon, and for lasting peace and security for Israeli, Palestinian, Lebanese and all people in the region;

(l) affirms its support for a two-state solution, a Palestinian State alongside Israel, so that Israelis and Palestinians can live securely within internationally recognised borders, as the only option to ensure a just and enduring peace;

(m) recognises the conflict is deeply distressing for many in the Australian community;

(n) condemns all acts of hatred, division or violence, affirming that they have no place in Australia; and

(o) reaffirms:

(i) that symbols of terror and discord are unwelcome in Australia and undermine our nation's peace and security,

(ii) that undermining social cohesion and unity by stoking fear and division risks Australia's domestic security, and

(iii) the responsibility of each Australian to safeguard the harmony and unity that define our diverse society, especially in times of adversity.

On the first anniversary of the October 7 attacks, we reflect on the horrific terrorist atrocity that reverberated around the world. We condemn Hamas's terrorism unequivocally. We call for the release of hostages immediately. October 7 is a day of grief. It is a day of pain: more than 1,200 innocent Israelis dead, the largest loss of Jewish life on any single day since the Holocaust. And so October 7 is also a day that recalls humanity's darkest memories: six million European Jews killed in the Holocaust following thousands of years of persecution and atrocities perpetrated against the Jewish people, this history being what finally resolved the international community to create the State of Israel. This history was brought back in our lifetimes as Hamas terrorists hunted down men, women and children in their homes, snatched people from their homes and targeted young people and a music festival with cold, brutal calculation—babies, the infirm, the elderly survivors of the Holocaust who had been promised 'never again' with the creation of Israel. Among those killed by Hamas was Australian Galit Carbone, and her family remains in my thoughts today and always will.

I commend to the Senate the excellent contribution by the Prime Minister earlier today. He talked about where we are a year on. He said:

We think of all whose lives and futures were stolen from them that day, as they tried to save themselves and their loved ones, and of all who have had them stolen since. We think of those whose lives remain suspended in the fear and isolation of captivity. And we think of those whose own lives and hearts are so intimately connected with the hostages who were kidnapped that day through the bonds of either blood or the embrace of friendship and community. This has been a year of pain, of loss and of grief.

He went on to say:

… this past year must have felt like a cruel eternity … their torment of not knowing the fate of a loved one who's been taken hostage or, indeed, having the terrible truth confirmed …

That horrific day spawned a terrible year of devastating loss of civilian life. Over 40,000 Palestinians have died, including over 11,000 Palestinian children, in Israel's response. It has been a humanitarian catastrophe. We've seen the displacement of millions. We've seen growing danger throughout the region as conflict spreads and escalates, growing numbers of Lebanese civilians killed or forced to flee their homes. And hostages are still held, with the daily agony of waiting and not knowing. There is no doubting the need for this suffering to end. There is no doubting the need for a ceasefire in Gaza. There is no doubting the need for peace and a ceasefire for Lebanon. There's no doubting the need to break the endless cycle of violence that grips the region and robs its future.

In the days following these horrific attacks, the Senate endorsed a wide-ranging bipartisan motion condemning the attacks on Israel by Hamas and supporting international law. In speaking to this, I said:

Australians are rightly distressed by this situation, and that distress is felt most acutely in our Jewish and Palestinian communities. This is a long, complex and disputed history, deeply felt, closely to the heart of many. The lived experiences and understandings of our different Australian communities are distinct.

…   …   …

… so I ask all of us: when we speak, let us speak with respect … understanding for difference. We should reject all in this country who seek to create division. We should all be striving for unity. We reject hate and condemn prejudice and discrimination in all its forms. We reject the terror perpetrated by Hamas and separate their heinous acts from the legitimate needs and aspirations of the Palestinian people. We stand firmly against antisemitism. We stand against Islamophobia. We stand against prejudice. We stand against hate speech in all its forms and we call it out when and where we see it. We must maintain mutual respect for each other here at home … We must preserve our uniquely harmonious multicultural character. It is why people come to this country and it is who we are as a country.

That's what I said on 16 October in this place.

It really grieves me that some in this building have taken the opposite path. Rather than focusing on what unites us in our community, too many have seen political benefit in exploiting differences for political gain. We've seen people who claim to be political leaders try to reproduce Middle East conflicts here. We've seen people spread falsehoods to manipulate pain and inflame anger, and at both ends of this issue we see politicians who would rather radicalise then unite. I say to this chamber that I don't think Australians want that. Australians know that it does nothing for our country. It does nothing to honour the dead. It does nothing to help the living, the people whose lives have been upended, sometimes destroyed, by the conflict in the Middle East.

Even today, in the House of Representatives, Mr Dutton refused to support a motion because it went beyond just words of comfort and words of recognition in relation to October 7. I would remind Mr Dutton that the motion he endorsed a year ago included the acknowledgement of the devastating loss of both Israeli and Palestinian life and an acknowledgement of the innocent civilians on all sides; supported justice and freedoms for Israelis and Palestinians; supported international efforts to establish and maintain humanitarian access into Gaza, including safe passage for civilians; and reiterated that Australia's current position in all contexts is to call for the protection of civilian lives and the observance of international law. That's what he signed up to last year—now look at his words. It's so disappointing that the man who seeks to be the alternative Prime Minister walks away from his previous position in order to be as divisive as possible. Mr Dutton always seeks to divide Australians, even when we most need to come together.

Underlying these political attempts to exploit grief is a fundamental distortion of reality—the suggestion that somehow it is uniquely in Australia's power to stop the conflict in the Middle East. We are not a central player in the Middle East. We are a respected voice, and we use that voice. We use it to advocate for the release of hostages. We use it to advocate for aid to flow. We use it to advocate for international humanitarian law to be upheld, including the protection of civilians and aid workers. We are being generous with our aid, with more than $80 million to support civilians devastated by this conflict. We are convening ministers from influential countries to pursue a new international declaration for the protection of humanitarian personnel. We are working with the international community to press for a two-state solution as the only hope to end this cycle of violence. We are working with the international community, including the US, the EU, the UK, Canada, Japan, Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Qatar, in calling for a ceasefire in Lebanon. We support the G7 leader statement from 3 October, which called for de-escalation and diplomacy at the same time as affirming Israel's security.

It is only through diplomatic efforts, ultimately, that we can end the suffering and foster peace. But, instead, we are seeing conflict worsen, with tragic consequences for innocent civilians. We again call on Iran to cease its destabilising actions, including through its terrorist proxies, the Houthis, Hezbollah and Hamas. Iran's missile attacks are an extremely dangerous escalation. In response to Iran's attacks on Israel, the Prime Minister, the Deputy Prime Minister and I have been clear that, under international law, Israel has a right to defend itself, and that includes a capacity to respond. However, we repeat our call for all sides to observe international law. Iran's attacks are an escalation at a time when what we need is de-escalation.

At this time, on this anniversary, we are reminded of the sanctity of human life and the value of peace. At this time, we remember that all innocent lives have equal value: Israeli, Palestinian and Lebanese—all of us; no exceptions. We remind ourselves that peace must be our purpose and our pursuit. The best way we can honour those lost is through the peace we help forge in their memory.

Simon Birmingham (SA, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

At 6.29 am on 7 October 2023, the music stopped at the Nova festival in Re'im. Twelve months ago yesterday, those festival-goers, young people dancing, enjoying a weekend out and living the life that so many young Australians do at similar festivals, stopped and entered a world of horror. They, along with close to 1,200 innocent children, women, elderly and families, were targeted and brutally murdered in Israel by the terrorist organisation Hamas. They were brutally, deliberately targeted, maimed, raped, tortured and murdered. This was a deliberate attack intended to strike at innocent people—not at military targets and not at terrorist infrastructure but simply at those living their lives. In fact, the irony of many of the deaths, including that of Australian Galit Carbone, is that those most likely to have died in the regions that were attacked, particularly the kibbutzes that were attacked, were those who had most worked to try to achieve peace and to give greater support to those who ultimately took their lives and destroyed their families.

We come now 12 months on from those times. We have in that period learnt ever more of the absolute horror. One of the challenges of the good fortune of being an Australian is that we cannot always fully comprehend. We do not always totally understand the horrors that happen elsewhere. Our good fortune as Australians and to get to live in this country is that, for the overwhelming majority of us, we are isolated from, insulated from and protected from the horrors that exist elsewhere. But, indeed, few people, if any, around the world truly comprehend and understand the scale of horror, the barbaric nature of the attacks of October 7 and how they unfolded. They were so deliberately barbaric and so rich in torture and inhumane acts that it's hard for any decent-meaning person, even those who have encountered the greatest of suffering, to fully understand what occurred. That is why, together with the sheer statistics—the reality that on that day we saw more Jewish people killed than on any other single day since the Holocaust—it has resonated so significantly and so deeply for Israel, for Jewish people around the world and for all who pause and reflect on the scale of loss and the depravity of the way in which that loss occurred.

There have been many moments in the last 24 hours, or the last 36 hours even, here in Australia and around the world of reflection on the anniversary. Some, of course, occurred in this city, and a number of us attended those, and other colleagues attended such commemorations in other places. For those of us who left the Israeli embassy last night following a moving tribute—and I join Senator Wong in acknowledging the words of Senator O'Neill and Senator Sharma, who both spoke at that tribute on behalf of the parliamentary friends of Israel—we left with a book called Testimonies Without Boundaries. Edited by Alon Penzel, it brings together some of those testimonies from October 7. It was quoted on the night, and, indeed, it is challenging to look, read and absorb some of the content within this book.

One is the testimony of Natan Kenig, a ZAKA volunteer—ZAKA being a disaster response volunteer organisation. Natan said: 'We arrived at the kibbutz, once again, on Wednesday morning. This day is engraved in my memory and will remain with me forever. Several days had already passed since the attack, and there was already a smell at this point. The terrible sights, combined with other senses, made the experience even more difficult.

The most horrific situation I encountered was when we entered one of the destroyed houses in the kibbutz after receiving a call about an extremely pungent smell from the place. We entered the house by climbing over the ruins because they were completely destroyed. Suddenly, we saw a mattress and a girl tied to it. We tried to separate her from the mattress, but we couldn't and didn't understand why. When we looked closer, we noticed that metal wires were running inside her body. We were sure these were threads from the mattress that had entered her body. Therefore we began to clear the rubble that was around the mattress.

What we saw under the rubble was unbelievable. Suddenly, we realised the girl was actually tied to a man, apparently her partner, on the other side of the mattress. Both were completely naked. They inserted metal wires into their bodies, through their stomachs, and tied them together on both sides of the mattress. Whole metal wires were inserted through the stomach, from both sides and to the both of them, so they would be tied together on both sides of the mattress. It was horrifying—that coldness. You can't contain it.'

It is hard to comprehend or understand how or why anyone would behave in such a barbaric way. Acts of war are always tragic. Acts of warfare always result in terrible suffering and loss of human life. But these were not acts of war; these were acts of terror to the full meaning and intent of that word 'terror'.

Late last year, I led a parliamentary delegation to Israel. Indeed, I visited the Kfar Aza kibbutz amongst other sites close to Gaza. At that site, some 64 peace-loving, family-loving civilians were killed alongside 22 soldiers. It was a site of a battle that went on beyond the initial attacks on 7 October. Nineteen hostages were taken. We are reminded that around 250 innocent hostages were taken and that around 100 remain held hostage—some likely dead, others still living, held in circumstances against their will. The terror for them and their families is enduring.

The hostages that have been found were held in Gaza, hidden in tunnel networks or amidst civilian infrastructure. That is a reminder that the suffering is not just of those Israelis from 7 October, and of their families who have suffered ever since, but, of course, also of those who Hamas has chosen to hide behind and amongst—Palestinian people in Gaza who continue to bear the pain and suffering of the fact that the terrorists use and abuse their base within Gaza and expose those people to the ultimate suffering too.

This conflict could have ended at any point during the last 12 months had Hamas been willing to release its hostages, surrender its terrorist infrastructure and allow proper peacekeeping to be undertaken, but instead when ceasefire efforts have been made and come close Hamas has rejected them. Hamas continues to hold the hostages. It continues to set terms in relation to the release of the hostages rather than putting the wellbeing of those people, and indeed that of the Palestinians, ahead of their own terrorist interests and instincts.

Throughout the last year I, like so many colleagues and I'm sure people across this place, have met with, stood with, hugged and consoled Jewish Australians. When speaking to the first motion passed here nearly 12 months ago, we spoke about the pain of Jewish Australians. It was already evident from the escalation in antisemitism. That had been clear all too tragically on the steps of the Sydney Opera House just shortly after the horrors of October 7 had become evident. Tragically, in the time that has ensued, those Jewish Australians have increasingly made clear, not only in their private conversations with many of us but increasingly very publicly too, how let down they feel by the Albanese government.

From the earliest days of this conflict, when the Albanese government was unable to even mention antisemitism without creating a false equivalence around the circumstances to Islamophobia, we've not seen Jewish Australians undertake rallies outside mosques or target other Australians in the way that, tragically, Jewish Australians have had their faith and their wellbeing deliberately targeted. Similarly, they feel pained and aggrieved that the ever-shifting Australian position on a two-state solution, which had enjoyed decades-long bipartisanship, is now under the Albanese government no longer to be a negotiated two-state solution, where the hard but necessary questions around matters such as negotiated borders, security guarantees and rights of return should be settled, but instead subject to some arbitrary timeline or ill-defined process.

These concerns of these Australians and others are real, and it is why, sadly, whilst we went to great lengths 12 months ago to find bipartisanship in the motion that was put through this chamber, we have not been in a position to do so on this occasion. I move the amendments to the government motion as circulated in the chamber in my name:

That the Senate—

(a) reiterates its unequivocal condemnation of Hamas' terror attacks on Israel which took place on 7 October 2023, in which more than 1,200 innocent Israelis were killed—the largest loss of Jewish life on any single day since the Holocaust—and the vow made by the perpetrators to repeat these attacks indefinitely;

(b) recognises that hundreds more innocent people were subjected to brutality and violence on that day;

(c) calls for the immediate and unconditional release of all remaining hostages;

(d) condemns the murder of hostages and the inhumane conditions and violence, including sexual violence, that hostages have experienced;

(e) mourns with all impacted by these heinous acts;

(f) reiterates that it stands with Israel and affirms its inherent right to defend itself and protect its citizens;

(g) condemns antisemitism in all its forms and stands with Jewish Australians who have felt the cold shadows of antisemitism reaching into the present day;

(h) reiterates Australia's consistent position isto call for the protection of civilian lives and adherence to international law;

(i) mourns the death and humanitarian suffering of all innocent Palestinian and Lebanese civilians placed in harm's way by the terrorists who hide behind and among them;

(j) supports ongoing international efforts to provide humanitarian assistance in Gaza and Lebanon;

(k) calls for Iran to cease its direct and indirect attacks on Israel, including through terrorist organisations the Houthis, Hezbollah and Hamas, all of whom are committed to the destruction of Israel;

(l) supports international efforts to negotiate and securelasting peace and security for Israeli, Palestinian, Lebanese and all people in the region;

(m) affirms its support for a negotiatedtwo-state solution, a futurePalestinian State alongside Israel, so that Israelis and Palestinians can live securely within internationally recognised borders;

(n) recognises the conflict is deeply distressing for many in the Australian community;

(o) condemns all acts of hatred, division or violence, affirming that they have no place in Australia;

(p) condemns the actions of those seeking to celebrate and promote the barbaric actions of terrorist organisations; and

(q) reaffirms:

(i) that symbols of terror and discord are abhorrent and unacceptablein Australia and undermine our nation's peace and security,

(ii) that undermining social cohesion and unity by stoking fear and division risks Australia's domestic security, and

(iii) the responsibility of each Australian, and visitor to Australia,to safeguard the harmony and unity that define our diverse society, especially in times of adversity.

These amendments do important things. Perhaps most importantly of all they reiterate that this Senate stands with Israel and affirms its inherent right to defend itself and protect its citizens. You have to ask: why does this need to be an amendment to a government motion? Because that is what we said 12 months ago. Twelve months ago this Senate said that it stood with Israel and affirmed Israel's inherent right to defend itself. Yet now the government refuses to incorporate those words in this motion.

There are other changes that we have made and propose to this motion, seeking to ensure that it actually does reflect the seriousness of the situation that continues to be faced. Twelve months ago I spoke about the threat of Iran. I said:

Let us not be asking, in five or 10 years time, what more could've been done to prevent Iran unleashing whatever atrocity its regime might commit, including the threat of a nuclear one.

Sadly, 12 months later, there is more not less to be concerned about, as we have seen Iran's tentacles of terror spread not just from Hamas but also with strikes against Israel by Hezbollah, the Houthi rebels striking not only against Israel but against broader Western interests and Iran themselves entering the fray with their direct military strikes—unprecedented strikes indeed.

I urge the Senate to support the amendments that we have circulated. I urge the government to reconsider and to give bipartisanship to a position that would be consistent with Australia's longstanding values, the values that have flowed through Hawke, Howard, Keating, Rudd and Gillard—consistent values—where we have stood as friends of Israel, stood for decency and stood, above all else, against the horrors of terrorism that we reflect upon today.

Jordon Steele-John (WA, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Australian Greens today mourn those killed on 7 October 2023, as well as the hundreds of thousands of civilians who have lost their lives in a spiral of violence that started long before 7 October and has gathered pace and continued since. The Greens continue our call for peace. The attacks of 7 October, the killing and traumatising of civilians and the taking of hostages, were appalling. The stories from that day are truly horrific and deserve nothing less than our most full condemnation as a Senate, as a parliament and as a community. These acts rightly moved so many in the Australian community to voice our compassion and our solidarity with all members of the Jewish community and all those impacted. Among those whose lives were taken were older people in their homes, young people enjoying a music festival and children who knew little of the history of the conflict that far predated them. This week is, again, a time to remember those who lost their lives and those who loved them.

There are many who are also now still waiting for news of their loved one's fate nearly a year after being taken hostage by Hamas and in the face of the refusal of the Netanyahu government to reach a ceasefire and to secure their release. The Greens reiterate our call for the unconditional release of hostages, just as we call for the release of the many thousands of Palestinians held as political prisoners in Israeli prisons. We condemn the taking of hostages. We condemn it now; we condemned it a year ago. We call it out for the war crime that it is and that it was. And we will continue to condemn hostage taking as a war crime, unconditionally, until the hostages are released.

The very same compassion, honesty and commitment to peace and justice required of us in the response to these Hamas attacks requires us as Greens to call out the war crimes and the genocide that is being carried out by the State of Israel right now in Gaza and the rest of the occupied territories and now reaching and including Lebanon. The extremist Netanyahu government's campaign of genocide in Gaza has claimed over 40,000 lives, and many pieces of credible academic research now put that figure at far, far more. These are human beings blasted away by unimaginable weapons of war. These are entire communities reduced to rubble. This is the displacement of millions of people.

The State of Israel's continued violation of international law in the West Bank has led to the largest and highest levels of forced relocations and illegal settlements in the country's history. This means that thousands of Palestinians have been forced from their homes in the West Bank since October 7. Many hundreds have died, and a just peace has been pushed further out of reach. In Lebanon, the Netanyahu government has unleashed a relentless campaign of bombardment with no regard for civilians. They have turned residential neighbourhoods into war zones and pushed an already unstable nation to the brink of collapse. How have we come to a time when the bombing of children is excused by our government, a time when the calls of UN experts and human rights organisations are ignored, dismissed and derided, a time when governments can't hear the cries of two million Palestinians in Gaza as the State of Israel's military drops bombs from planes using Australian made parts?

The International Court of Justice has made clear that the State of Israel's occupation of Palestine is unlawful and based on apartheid. The occupation underlies the escalating cycle of violence in the Middle East, and it must end. Australia is not just a bystander in this conflict. By refusing to support the UN resolutions on Palestinian statehood, by refusing to support South Africa's International Court of Justice case, by refusing to engage with the genuine aspirations of the Australian community to see a just peace and to see those individuals responsible for these war crimes, including Netanyahu and his cabinet, face sanctions and be brought to justice before the International Criminal Court, by continuing to import Israeli weapons and continuing to export parts, including parts for the F-35 fighter, that are used by the Israeli military, Australia is complicit in this appalling conflict.

The Labor government must listen to the community and join with the community in pushing for a just peace by recognising the statehood of Palestine, sanctioning the extremist Netanyahu government, ending the two-way arms trade and pushing for a just and lasting peace for Israelis, Palestinians and Lebanese. We must never forget that in war it is always civilians who pay the highest price. Peace must always be our goal. It is in that spirit that I foreshadow the amendment standing in my name:

Omit all words after "That", substitute:

"the Senate:

(a) commemorates the victims of 7 October 2023 and reiterates its condemnation of the attacks;

(b) calls for the unconditional release of the hostages and political prisoners;

(c) condemns all forms of racism including anti-semitism and Islamophobia;

(d) condemns the State of Israel's ongoing genocide and war crimes in Gaza that have killed more than 41,000 people and the ongoing illegal actions and bombing in the West Bank, Syria and Lebanon;

(e) notes the International Court of Justice has made clear the State of Israel's occupation of Palestine is unlawful and based on apartheid;

(f) believes the illegal occupation underlies the escalating cycle of violence in the Middle East which must come to an end; and

(g) calls on the Government to take meaningful action towards a just and lasting peace for Israelis and Palestinians and others in the Middle East by implementing the recommendations of the UN Special Rapporteurs and ending the two-way arms trade and placing sanctions on Netanyahu's extremist government".

These are the actions we must take if we are to end the complicity of this government and, at its hand, our nation in these most terrible crimes.

Bridget McKenzie (Victoria, National Party, Shadow Minister for Infrastructure, Transport and Regional Development) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Yesterday on the lawns of Parliament House, I was talking to a Jewish grandmother who was nearly in tears as she was telling me about her grandson who is 10 years old and at an Australian primary school. His best friend had to tell him recently that he couldn't come to his birthday. When he asked why, this young boy was told that it was because he was Jewish. They've both decided, as two 10-year-old best friends, to stay best friends at school, despite one of them being Jewish and it being against parents' advice. They're not going to tell their mates' parents that they're going to stay friends. That is actually what's happening in our primary schools to Australian kids. This isn't Germany in the 1930s; these are Australian students in Australian primary schools who aren't able to stay friends because one of them is an Australian Jew.

A year ago, on 7 October, when we heard what was actually coming out of Israel—we didn't know the extent of the horror that had been visited—we all stood and moved a joint motion here, and many senators spoke to that. A year on, I can barely recognise our country and what's been wrought here as a result of the devastation in Israel. It is becoming normalised in our children, in our schools, in our universities and on our streets.

Antisemitism in Germany didn't start with gas chambers or Jews in cattle trucks; it started with protests. It started with hate speech. It started with antisemitism being normalised. That journey slowly progressed through the 1930s. By 1938, before World War II started, it had reached catastrophic proportions, and I don't need to regale this chamber with the horrors of the Holocaust. At the end of World War II, the world came together to say: 'Never again can this occur. Never again can we treat a group of humanity in this way.' We all pledged that that would not occur and the Jewish people were given a homeland. The Jews of Judea could actually return and begin to build the modern State of Israel.

Here in Australia, we have had a bipartisan approach to the State of Israel, its success and the fact that it pursues peace in what is a very troubled space, with neighbours and terrorist organisations who would seek to wipe it from the face of the earth. When people chant, 'From the river to the sea,' be very clear about what's being said and the messages that are being sent: you don't have a right to exist.

Both parties of government having a bipartisan approach to this question over many, many decades has been the way that this country has chosen to support a liberal democracy's growth and success in the Middle East. Indeed, it is how Australia has become home—the cherished home—for so many Jews who, fleeing a war-torn Europe, have made such a wonderful contribution to our young democracy in the decades since.

But over the last 12 months, those very people—the academics, the Jewish students, the business owners, the supporters of the arts—have been subjected to horrific things. Businesses have been boycotted in this country because they're run by Australian Jews. Academics have had their offices pissed on. That's not in some Third World country; that is actually—

Catryna Bilyk (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator McKenzie, please withdraw the language.

Bridget McKenzie (Victoria, National Party, Shadow Minister for Infrastructure, Transport and Regional Development) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I withdraw the colloquial language. I'll be more accurate—urinated on at university campuses. Australian Jewish students have been spat on at campuses in this country, and somehow that is okay because some other Australian student doesn't agree with their right to be mourning family and to be standing up for Israel's right to exist. And we've had Jewish members of parliament treated abhorrently.

I had the great privilege of visiting Israel a few months ago to visit the site of the Nova music festival—the site of such atrocities. I want to know: where are the feminists, with the horrific rapes that occurred? I was able to visit Kibbutz Be'eri, where Danny Majzner showed us around from house to house. Yes, the blood had been wiped away and the bodies were no longer there, but the devastation that had been wrought was left there as a very powerful reminder to us of what actually occurred. Above every single house where this had occurred, for the people that had lived there that had lost their lives, their photos and a description of what happened were there. In that kibbutz, Galit Carbone, an Australian Israeli citizen, lost her life.

We met with the families of hostages and heard of their sorrow. We went to the Galilee and, on the morning we were there, there had been 32 missiles—thank goodness for the Iron Dome—launched from southern Lebanon by Hezbollah into what is an Arab community of Druze, who also see themselves as Israeli. We all came together as a globe and said, 'Never again,' and to find ourselves here only a short few decades later is, I think, appalling. A conservative philosopher a long time ago said, 'The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for good men'—and, I believe, in the 21st century that should include 'good women'—'to do nothing.'

For the sake of politeness, for the sake of not wanting to make a fuss, for the sake of not wanting to offend each other, we have allowed these atrocities to go unmarked, have not borne full witness to what actually happened, have not spoken honestly, have glossed over the gory and grotesque details. What happened a year ago was a group of people who didn't just want to start a war. When you go into the details—if I have time, I will be reading from the Testimonies Without Boundaries book, which does go to the horror of what actually occurred on that day. We gloss over that so we can just skip over the inhumanity and say this is just an ancient war and these are just two tribes fighting. No. One group of people wants to create a nation-state with safe and secure borders and get on with living life, and the other parties to this tragedy sought to destroy, denigrate and dehumanise their victims.

I also, on that visit with many other of my colleagues—Dan Tehan, James Paterson, Garth Hamilton, Jacinta Nampijinpa Price and Bert van Manen—watched the horrific 45 minutes of footage, which wasn't some IDF scam. It was actually live footage taken from the cameras of the Hamas terrorists as they went on their rampage. There have been media reports about how horrific this footage was, and you cannot unsee Palestinians, as Janet Albrechtsen says, cheering the arrivals of trucks laden with human beings as carcasses of terrorism. It captured some of the horror of innocent people being murdered, some beheaded, hunted down, raped, kicked, bashed, burnt alive—adults, babies, children. That's what happened, and we shouldn't turn our eyes away from it. We should not turn our ears away from this horror.

Yesterday was an opportunity to remember those victims, to actually pray for the families impacted and recognise the resilience of the Israeli people and the Jewish people. That is why so many of us gathered in community events around the country, in suburbs and in capital cities, to mourn, to respect, to remember, to pray and also, in some moments, experience great joy, as with those of us that gathered on the front lawns of Parliament House yesterday, dancing for the survival and the future of the Jewish people and Israel and their resilience. I just want to read a piece from the ambassador of Israel to Australia from last night's commemoration service:

'In the early morning hours of Saturday 7 October 2023, Hamas terrorists infiltrated Israel and brutally murdered more than 1,200 people, including Australian Galit Carbone. They wounded almost 5,000 people and kidnapped 251 men, women, young children and the elderly. As of today, 101 people, including two children, remain in Hamas captivity. We will continue to do everything in our power to bring them home.

'Yesterday, we lit a candle in memory of the victims of October 7 and shared the testimonies of those who survived. October 7 saw the greatest loss of Jewish life since the Holocaust, and the depravity of that day will never be forgotten. May their memory be a blessing.'

The reason why the world decided 'never again' was that it was so atrocious, so inhumane. Yet here we are again, and there are people who yesterday sought to celebrate those atrocities as if, somehow, it was justified and as if, somehow, Israel and the Jewish people deserved to be attacked, deserved to be dehumanised and deserved the attempt to destroy them.

What we've seen is our government refuse to bear witness to this horror and spend 12 months making some moral equivalence between the antisemitism of what happened on 7 October, the antisemitism which is being normalised in this country and Islamophobia. They've chosen to somehow make moral equivalency. They've trashed decades of bipartisanship around the State of Israel, its status as an ally and our commitment to its ongoing survival and to a Jewish state here in the modern world.

It's been absolutely appalling to see that equivocation, because it has allowed the celebration of those atrocities to occur in capital cities right across the country, including at sacred places like the Shrine of Remembrance in Melbourne in my home state. We stand with Israel. We stand with the Jewish people and with Jewish Australians. You will win.

Anne Ruston (SA, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Health and Aged Care) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to acknowledge the unimaginable pain, anguish and suffering of the 101 remaining hostages, their families, their friends and their communities, and of all Jewish people here in Australia and around the world. The 7 October attack represented an organised massacre of Jewish people on a scale not seen in any of our lifetimes. We witnessed suffering that continues to be unimaginable. It must not be ignored, and it must not be diminished.

One year on, we are reminded that our efforts must not stop until every one of those hostages is accounted for. Those hostages, including a baby, are held in conditions that defy comprehension. There are hostages who remain in chains. There are hostages who remain in fear of being executed. There are hostages who are trapped, away from their families and their loved ones. They must all be brought home.

It is our duty to commit to memory the events of that day, to stand against the tide of denial and distortion and to honour the memory of those victims who have lost their lives. It is our duty to keep our thoughts with those 101 hostages and their families as they continue to suffer unimaginable horrors. It is also our duty to stand against the rot of antisemitism that the atrocities of October 7 have exposed here in Australia. Since that day we have seen members of the Australian Jewish community endure amazing and immense hostility, intimidation and aggression from fellow Australians. This is not only unacceptable but quite unimaginable in a nation such as ours, a nation that prides itself on being welcoming to people of all faiths and all backgrounds, on being an accepting and safe community that embraces all cultures.

In line with the values of our nation, the Australian Jewish community must be provided with the protection and the support which they deserve, particularly in this time of great grief. Together, we must stand against evil, an evil which saw 1,200 Jews murdered on 7 October 2023, an evil which still holds 101 people hostage and which attempts to infiltrate our community with hate. My thoughts are with the entire Jewish community. I stand with Israel. Let's bring them home.

Quorum formed.

Raff Ciccone (Victoria, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I'll just make the point that the quorum count wasn't about me. But, in any event, I'm here to speak. I rise to reflect on the first anniversary of the October 7 Hamas terrorist attack and express my enduring support for the people of Israel and the Australian Jewish community. Like many of my parliamentary colleagues, I was deeply moved at last night's commemorative event held at the Embassy of Israel in Canberra to mark the first anniversary of those deadly October 7 attacks. It was a solemn gathering and a moment of reflection to honour the more than 1,250 innocent people—predominantly Israelis but also people from Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Chile, France, Germany, Mexico, Nepal, Russia, Thailand and, sadly, Australia—who were brutally murdered in the most significant loss of Jewish life in a single day since the Holocaust in World War II. I thank the Israeli ambassador, Amir Maimon, for inviting us to his home to join him and his staff, his family and members of the Australian Jewish community for such a moving and difficult occasion of mourning.

As was evident last night and in vigils held right across the country and the world, the horror of October 7 has by no means diminished. Hamas's massacre of 1,250 civilians and the kidnapping of over 250 people, of which 101 remain in captivity and two are children, are unforgivable. Innocent people, many of them children, were victims of acts of senseless violence: rape, torture, mutilation, burnings and murder. Our government, like those of all right-thinking nations of the world, has condemned the attacks by Hamas on Israel one year ago, and we condemn them now. There are no reasons that can be given to justify such acts of such callous murder. Barbarism is one way I would describe it. There is no context in which what happened on October 7 is excusable.

Our government proudly stands with Israel, and it will always stand with Israel. This is because standing with Israel is part of who we are as the Australian Labor Party. Let us not forget the role of HV Evatt, Labor's Minister for External Affairs in the Chifley government, as he was one of the architects of the 1947 United Nations partition plan. Doc Evatt's work leading those negotiations as chair of the Ad Hoc Committee on the Palestinian Question and later as president of the UN General Assembly was instrumental to the formation of the modern State of Israel. He considered it his greatest achievement while in office.

When Prime Minister Bob Hawke welcomed the Israeli president to Australia in 1986, he rightly observed the 'friendship between our countries goes back to the foundation of the modern State of Israel'. Since Israel's modern foundation as a sovereign state, Labor has celebrated Israel's many successes as a thriving democracy in the region, a democracy where civil rights, women's rights and LGBTQIA+ rights are respected and upheld. We have celebrated the wonderful contribution its peoples have made to Australia.

It saddens me that there are some in this place, particularly on the crossbench and in the Australian Greens political party, who have sought to cause division in our community on this issue. Some have encouraged people, protesters, to attend rallies where words of hatred are spoken, where symbols of terror are displayed. Some have attended these demonstrations themselves, getting on stages and speaking in ways that seek to divide Australians rather than uniting each and every one of us. All the while, some have chosen to peddle misinformation, to exploit genuine concern in our community over the situation in the Middle East, simply for political gain, through their anti-Israel rhetoric.

One common piece of misinformation peddled by them is that Australia is supplying weapons to Israel. Any suggestion that Australia has supplied weapons to Israel is simply false. The Department of Defence has confirmed repeatedly that Australia has not supplied weapons to Israel—and this distinction is also worth mentioning—since the Hamas-Israel conflict began and for at least the past five years. We have seen repeated attempts by some senators, by some from the Australian Greens party, to pursue these mistruths in estimates, and the Greens continue to push this false narrative to create more tension.

This type of behaviour must be called out, and it must stop. It must stop because words do matter. What we say in this place matters. We are being watched and listened to by millions of Australians. Some do listen, as they probably are tonight, to the Senate, watching what the leaders of their community—that is us, the members who are elected; we are leaders of our community—say about this very issue.

There are some whose mission it is to inflame division in our community. I hate to say that, but it is simply true. Those people do not belong in this place. But we do live in a democracy, and we have to respect each other and how we get here in this place. It is a message worth saying publicly and proudly, that people who do come into this place, who are elected to make decisions on behalf of their community, have some level of responsibility and need to look at how they conduct themselves in this chamber.

The language of division, the language of hate, has a very real effect outside these walls. I condemn, in the strongest possible terms, the rise of antisemitism in our country and those who encourage it. It breaks my heart that the Australian Jewish community have been and continue to be subjected to such hateful prejudice. People are hiding behind the fact that we don't call them antisemitic; we call them Zionists. They are using words, trying to be clever and smart about the debates that occur and the discourse that is happening right now, but they are picking and choosing words so that technically they're not racist. But we know that there are a lot of people in this place who are using racist motives because of their deep hatred for Jewish people.

A people whose history has been so characterised by persecution by others should feel safe in a country like ours. Australia is built on harmony. We embrace multiculturalism, unless you're Jewish. Is that what we're trying to say to people in the Jewish community? A country of multiculturalism, tolerance and peace—that's who we are as Australians. There is no place in our community for antisemitism, hate speech or any kind of racism.

The Jewish community in our country are proud Australians who have contributed so much to our way of life. In the same way, my parents came from Italy and made sacrifices for their children. Guess what? There are people like me, my brother and others in my family who have benefited from the sacrifices of their parents. In the same way, many Jewish mums and dads and their parents have made sacrifices for their next generation, their kids. They are also now members of the federal parliament, which is something that would have been unimaginable for families like mine and others in this place. Australia is the lucky country, and it should stay that way.

Like every Australian, they have the right to live their lives without fear. This is not to say that people don't have a right to protest and express their views; of course they do. That's what living in a democracy is all about—democracies like Australia and democracies like the State of Israel. That is what it's all about. But in exercising such rights comes responsibilities. It is incumbent on those who do that they do so in a respectful and law-abiding manner and in a way that does not incite hatred or violence. Today we might discuss the issues in the Middle East, but tomorrow there'll be another issue. We've always got to have a long-term outlook in terms of how we conduct ourselves in public.

Our government will continue to advocate for a peaceful solution to the situation in the Middle East, but, in doing so, you can only do it where both sides also recognise each other's borders. That is something that is also worth noting in this debate. There are those in the Middle Eastern region who do not want peace—not all, but there are most, I think, who don't. There are those in the region who do not respect the rights of others to exist. Our government regards many of these organisations as terrorist organisations. They are Hamas and Hezbollah. But, in condemning them and those who support them, we must not overlook the role of Iran in facilitating their trade in terror. Iran has a lot to answer for—sponsoring these terrorist organisations and using them as proxies for the war. Rather than building peace in the region, innocent civilians are dying—their own citizens and many others in neighbouring countries.

Israel has a right to defend itself. It has a right to defend itself against terror and those who practice it. Israelis have the right to sleep safely in their beds, to gaze upon a sky that isn't littered with rockets. The 101 hostages that remain in captivity have the right to return to their families to live a life of peace, as do the many, many Palestinians. There is no solution to this conflict other than a two-state solution, but this solution can only come about through the elimination of terror and those who practice it. It is my hope to one day see an Israeli state and a Palestinian state side by side, where the citizens of each of their respective countries can live in peace and with dignity, respecting each other's borders.

As we mark one year since the October 7 attacks, we pause to remember the many innocent victims, call for the release of all hostages, stand in solidarity with the vibrant Australian Jewish community and continue to pray for peace in the region.

James Paterson (Victoria, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Cyber Security) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Today's motion is about what happened 12 months ago in Israel. It is about the 1,200 men, women and children who were murdered by Hamas. It is about the 250 who were kidnapped. It is about the 100 who remain as hostages in Gaza today. It is about kibbutz Be'eri, where an Australian, Galit Carbone, was killed. It is about her brother, Danny, who survived that massacre and suffers the scars of what happened on that day. It is about the Nova music festival, where the young people who were raped, tortured and murdered were killed simply because they were Jews. It is about the worst loss of Jewish life in a single day since the Holocaust. It is about Israel's right to defend itself, free the hostages and restore deterrence in the region. But it is also about our country and the country we want to be, because over the last 12 months at times it has been hard to recognise Australia. It was hard to recognise Australia on 9 October last year at the Sydney Opera House. It was hard to recognise Melbourne or Sydney last weekend when people waved the flags of a listed terrorist organisation, Hezbollah, in open defiance of the law. It has been hard to recognise our major cities most weekends in the last year when the symbols and logos of Hamas or the al-Qassam brigades have been proudly on display and no-one has been charged for it.

We have seen a truly shocking rise in antisemitism here at home since 7 October. I have heard incredibly distressing stories from members of the Jewish community who have happily lived their whole lives in Australia. They've told me that they are contemplating moving to Israel because they think they'll feel safer in a country under attack from three terrorist organisations simultaneously than they do walking the streets of Sydney or Melbourne. I've heard from Holocaust survivors who've lived here safely for decades who now don't want their children or grandchildren to go into the city on weekends because they fear for their wellbeing. Jewish students have told us in excruciating detail about how unwelcome and unsafe they feel on campus in 2024 in Australia. Jewish kindergartens and schools don't just require armed guards, so do Jewish aged-care homes.

We even saw people gather to protest on 7 October, in defiance of calls from the Prime Minister, premiers and police—and, frankly, in defiance of all good taste and decency. At one of those protests yesterday, at the Lakemba mosque, one speaker said the quiet part out loud. Khaled Beydoun said: 'Today is not a day that is full of mourning. Today is a day that marks celebration.' The truth is that what we have seen in the last year is a stain on our great country. I never thought we would witness scenes like this in our country, and it didn't have to be this way. Yes, conflicts on the other side of the world always have the potential to divide us, but we could and should have kept those divides respectful and within the acceptable boundaries of normal civil disagreement.

We could have had protests without incitement, concern for the loss of civilian life without sympathy for terrorism and disagreement without division. The missing ingredient has been leadership. When confronted with the gravest antisemitism crisis in our history, the Prime Minister has vacated the field. He has failed to use the power of his office to send a strong signal about what we will not tolerate as a country. He has failed to ensure that the law is enforced. He has failed to stand with our friend and ally when facing its most dangerous assault since it was established in 1948. Instead of moral clarity we've got equivocation. Instead of moral strength we've got impotence. Instead of moral courage we've had weakness. It is no wonder that extremists have been emboldened. It is no wonder that our laws are being flouted. And it is no wonder that the Jewish community feels let down, abandoned and betrayed at a time of their greatest suffering. For however long I remain in public life and in whatever position I hold, I will work every day to fix this and I will not rest until it is fixed, because our country is better than this.

Lidia Thorpe (Victoria, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I want to start by saying that any loss of life is a tragedy. These are people with friends, family and community. They are people. Violence, the violation of human lives and the violation of international humanitarian law can never be justified. We must never lose sight of each other's humanity—never.

This week, a year on, is painful for all of us. I acknowledge and feel the grief of all those who have lost loved ones, who lost their homes, who lost everything. I acknowledge and feel the grief of their communities and everyone standing with them. I stand with you. I stand against the dispossession, violence and murder of people here and everywhere. I stand against genocide. As a black woman living through an ongoing genocide here in this country, with many of my own clans wiped out, wiped off the face of the earth by the colonisers, 63 clans, I stand in solidarity with all victims of genocide. We have to call out genocide when and wherever it occurs, and there is no question at all that there is a genocide occurring right in front of our eyes in Palestine.

Genocide is reliant on the dehumanisation of others to justify inhumane action. Since 7 October, we have heard Netanyahu describe Gaza as a city of darkness and ask people to flee or face certain death. Of the Palestinians, Netanyahu says: 'We are facing monsters. It is a battle of civilisation against barbarism.' The Israeli defence minister said, 'We are fighting human animals, and we are acting accordingly.' Several Israeli military politicians have described Palestinians as cockroaches, a cancer and a vermin that should be annihilated. Have we heard Albanese or Penny Wong denounce this language? No. We have only heard support for Israel. The language is familiar. The Australian government called the First Peoples on this land savages and barbarians to justify their slaughter, the massacres that happened to my people. We were dehumanised by the coloniser too. The pillaging and rape of our country, our culture and our people—the First Peoples of this land know what genocide looks and feels like.

For over a year our communities have stood firmly together and shown up in the streets every week calling loudly for an end to the genocide, for a weapons embargo on Israel, for visas, for aid, for food, for this country to stop sending weapon parts for the F-35 fighter jets that are used to indiscriminately bomb civilians. We have stood in solidarity to protest against genocide, against war, against racism and against colonisation. We've stood up against what is happening in Palestine, the Congo, Sudan, West Papua, Tibet and Kanaks. We see this for what it is: colonial powers maintaining and expanding their systems of oppression, exploitation and violence.

We protest for those in our communities whose loved ones are being slaughtered by violent, greedy governments. We protest for those being used for fodder in this bloody expansion of the colony. We protest for our safety, our rights, our lives and our liberation. We protest to show that we care and that we stand together, side by side. We protest to show that Palestine has not been abandoned. We protest because we love and care deeply about each other's shared humanity. We protest to protect each other. This is a human rights movement—an anti-war movement that is standing up to the federal government, which is showing no morality and is absolutely complicit in genocide.

Not only has this government looked away as the State of Israel ethnically cleanses the Palestinians as they breach international law just to build vacation homes and extract gas and steal water; this government has gone further. It has offered diplomatic support and helped the Israeli regime build the weapons that are used to commit their war crimes. This government has provided not just impunity but active support—blood on your hands. Those who have lost family and loved ones already feel like they have lost everything. Every day, more news could arrive of another heartbeat snuffed out. How can we have social cohesion when our government is enabling the killing of those in our community?

It is our duty to protest against genocide. It is our duty to stop genocide. It was a protest from the union movement here in so-called Australia that helped break apartheid in South Africa, even while Nelson Mandela was listed as a terrorist by the US for trying to do exactly that. None of us are free unless we are all free. What comes of international inaction? Israel has set its sights on Lebanon. Why wouldn't it? What consequences has it faced for its genocide from so-called Australia, from Germany and from its closest allies, the US and the UK?

When so-called Australia tells so-called Israel, 'You have claimed this land, so you can do what you like,' it is giving itself permission to do the same on land it has claimed and continue the genocide against First Peoples here. In the acts of violence and dispossession being committed by Israel, so-called Australia sees itself reflected back. No consent was given to take the Palestinians' land or our land, yet we are told to take the exploitation, murder, rape and pillaging of our people, country and culture quietly. 'Don't protest.' We are not allowed to protest against genocide and occupation! You come after the protesters.

The frontier wars continue wherever the militarised police and army are involved, through more sophisticated tactics of administration or incarceration. The police went to the New South Wales courts to block the Palestinian protests that happened this weekend. This is not new. The right to protest is being eroded across the continent. We will not stop for any illegal colonial government, such as this place here. There is no consent for this place to be here. It's through invasion and massacre that this parliament sits here on a gathering place of Ngambri and Ngunnawal people. You just wiped them off their land and built this monstrosity. We're not going to stop protesting. We're going to hold you all to account.

Albanese talks about the need for social cohesion, something no-one would disagree with. But the real question is: how can you address the injustice you're responding to? Social cohesion doesn't just happen—duh, Albo. It's a response to perceived injustice.

Hollie Hughes (NSW, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Mental Health and Suicide Prevention) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

( ): Senator Thorpe, refer to people by their title.

Lidia Thorpe (Victoria, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

'Prime Minister Genocide'.

Hollie Hughes (NSW, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Mental Health and Suicide Prevention) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Thorpe.

Lidia Thorpe (Victoria, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Prime Minister. If people are protesting what they see as an unjust and inhumane genocide, the first step toward social cohesion is to come to the table with legitimacy and recognise that there can be no cohesion as long as the injustice persists. The Vietnam protests ended when the Vietnam War ended. Protests against apartheid in South Africa stopped once apartheid was dismantled. First Peoples here, the Palestinian people, the Kanak people, the Tibetans and many more continue to live, love and resist. We celebrate and acknowledge the warriors and the continued, lasting legacies of all the resistance, the love and the culture. We are still here. The Palestinians and the Lebanese are still here. We are one with country, and we are rooted in the land and in each other. Together, we have an unlimited amount of love, joy and grief between us. We will never stop. We are a never-ending song and storyline.

To those who commit this violence: you will be stopped. There will be no injustice left. There will be peace and liberation—that will be our legacy. You or your children or your children's children will look back and condemn this genocide. The truth will be told far and wide that the western civilisation you have built sits upon the graves of our people—that is your legacy. You live with that; you sleep with that at night.

The truth has splintered the narrative and the truth will set us free. We must continue to call out genocide, racism, antisemitism, Islamophobia and human rights abuses everywhere we see them. We must make a commitment to truth, healing, treaty and justice. In the words of Kieran Stewart Assheton:

Our leadership is grounded in a deep connection to the land and a commitment to collective wellbeing that transcends individual or profit motives … that priorities the needs of the people and planet.

Kieran is pointing to something important: a commitment to taking direction from our elders and to lead with love and understanding.

I acknowledge this debate has taken place on the unceded sovereign lands of the real sovereigns—because this place ain't sovereign. You're not from here. This colonial government is not from here; it's from England. Charlie is your boss—our boss—

Hollie Hughes (NSW, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Mental Health and Suicide Prevention) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Thorpe!

Lidia Thorpe (Victoria, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Don't tell me I've got to call him the King.

Hollie Hughes (NSW, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Mental Health and Suicide Prevention) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

You do need to refer to people by their correct titles, please, Senator Thorpe.

Lidia Thorpe (Victoria, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

King coloniser Charlie—

Hollie Hughes (NSW, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Mental Health and Suicide Prevention) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Thorpe, please withdraw and refer to the King in the appropriate terms.

Lidia Thorpe (Victoria, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The King of England is not sovereign here. That's a matter of fact, everybody. So I acknowledge the unceded sovereign lands of the real sovereign people of this land, the Ngunnawal and Ngambri people, and I pay my respects to the real sovereign elders and the real sovereign matriarchs and communities across these lands. From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.

James McGrath (Queensland, Liberal National Party, Shadow Assistant Minister to the Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Bring them home. Bring all of them home. Too many Australians have forgotten the hostages held by Hamas. Too many Australians have forgotten what actually happened on 7 October. I can't forget. I won't forget. I haven't forgotten. Three times I have stood in this Australian Senate and read out the names of the hostages held by Hamas.

Today, for the fourth time in this Australian Senate, I will read out the names of the remaining hostages held by Hamas: Tamir Adar, Mohammed El Atrash, Hisham al-Sayed, Hamza Alziadana, Youssef Alziadana, Liri Elbag, Edan Alexander, Matan Angrest, Karina Ariev, Aviv Atzili, Sahar Baruch, Uriel Baruch, Ohad Ben Ami, Agam Berger, Gali Berman, Ziv Berman, Ariel Bibas, Kfir Bibas, Shiri Bibas, Yarden Bibas, Elkana Bohbot, Rom Braslavski, Itay Chen, Sagui Dekel-Chen, Eliya Cohen, Nimrod Cohen, Amiram Cooper, Ariel Cunio, David Cunio, Evyatar David, Itzhak Elgarat, Ronen Engel, Daniella Gilboa, Guy Gilboa-Dalal, Meni Godard, Hadar Goldin, Romi Gonen, Ran Gvili, Gad Haggai, Judy Weinstein Haggai, Tal Haimi, Inbar Haiman, Maxim Herkin, Eitan Horn, Yair Horn, Tsachi Idan, Guy Iluz, Bipin Joshi, Ofer Kalderon, Segev Kalfon, Ofra Keidar, Bar Avraham Kuperstein, Eitan Levy, Shay Levinson, Naama Levy, Or Levy, Oded Lifshitz, Shlomo Mansour, Eliyahu Margalit, Avera Mengistu, Omri Miran, Joshua Loitu Mollel, Eitan Abraham Mor, Gadi Moshe Moses, Omer Neutra, Tamir Nimrodi, Yosef Chaim Ohana, Alon Ohel, Avinathan Or, Dror Or, Daniel Oz, Daniel Perez, Lior Rudaeff, Jonathan Samerano, Eli Sharabi, Yossi Sharabi, Oron Shaul, Omer Shem-Tov, Tal Shoham, Idan Shtivi, Keith Samuel Siegel, Doron Steinbrecher, Itay Svirsky, Alexander 'Sasha' Troufanov, Ilan Weiss, Omer Wenkert, Yair Yaakov, Ohad Yahalomi, Arbel Yehud, Arye Zalmanovich and Matan Zangauker.

It's been a year since the first pogrom of the 21st century and a year since 7 October. Bring all these hostages home to their families. Bring them home now so their families can be reunited.

Jane Hume (Victoria, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for the Public Service) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The day of 7 October 2023 is one that forever changed Israel and sent shock right around the world. The images that are seared onto our memories and into our collective consciousness are from the photographs of those that were killed and those that were taken hostage, but they're also from the body cameras that the Hamas terrorists were wearing. They live streamed their atrocities to the world.

Those terrorists were armed with machine guns, knives, grenades and RPGs. They invaded a music festival, where they raped and murdered terrified attendees. They set up roadblocks along highways to gun down unsuspecting families. They infiltrated villages, where they shot victims point-blank and burned homes with their families inside. Innocent people were raped and they were tortured and they were mutilated.

One thousand one hundred and thirty-nine innocent people were targeted and brutally murdered in Israel by Hamas. Thirty-six were children. The youngest was 10-month-old Mila Cohen, who was shot. Three hundred and sixty-four were young people attending a music festival. Two hundred and fifty more innocent people were taken hostage and have been hidden in the Hamas tunnels of Gaza under civilian infrastructure in conditions that can only be found in our nightmares. Senator McGrath just named those hostages. Around 100 of them remain in captivity. Some of those are already confirmed dead, but their families cannot bury them.

This was not an act of war. There were no rules of engagement. There was no Geneva convention. This was not an act of defence. There was no distinction between civilian and combatant. October 7 was a massacre. It was an act of pure barbarism beyond all comprehension. The trauma inflicted in this one day in this one act has echoed around the globe.

But, as unspeakable as it was, rather than a unified outpouring of grief and of comfort to a community that were racked with their own grief, over the past 12 months that anguish, the anguish of Jewish people in Israel and around the world, has been compounded by fear. Antisemitism, an ugly phenomenon that many felt had been relegated to history, has returned. It has bubbled up. It has boiled over, even in Australia. It's on our streets, it's in our social media and it's in our universities. And it's particularly rampant in my home state of Victoria. In fact, according to Australia's antisemitism envoy, Jillian Segal, Victoria is the worst state in Australia for antisemitism.

As of a few weeks ago there were more than 800 antisemitic incidents recorded just since October 7 last year. That is up from just 200—although 200 is too many—in the previous 12 months. Just last weekend a woman in her 60s stopped me at the gym and said that she was a fifth generation Jewish Australian woman, that her father had fought for Australia in World War II, and that, for the first time in her life, she was scared. Another woman stopped me in the supermarket and showed me her small tattoo of the Star of David on her arm. She said that she would no longer wear her necklace in public. What's happened here? This is my neighbourhood. This is my home, our home. This is their home. When did fear become acceptable?

It's not just older Jewish Australians either. There are hundreds of submissions to the inquiry into Antisemitism at Australian Universities Bill 2024. But there is one in particular I want to share from a young woman named Mia. These are her words:

October 7th was an unimaginable terror. It is still unfathomable. For me, October 7th in Australia started off as a normal day, I watched the St Kilda Women play footy with a mate and stayed off my phone for most of the day. During half-time, my phone blew up with notifications about rockets entering Israel but growing up like this, you become desensitized so I didn't think much of it. On the morning of October 8th, I woke up to horror that is still engraved in my heart and my mind. I knew this moment would change the trajectory of my life, however I didn't understand the impact it would have on the international community as well, especially not the Australian. I could've never imagined it would get like this.

She then goes on to talk about her experience at university:

A place that was new and exciting, over time became a place I was reluctant to go to. I felt unsafe with the crowd of abusive Pro-Palestinians that protested inside my University. I was constantly being reminded of October 7th, but this time, it was about its "justification". The anti-israel crowd was intense and unforgiving, stopping individuals in crowded hallways and spewing hateful language. This hateful language was not just anti-Israel, but anti-Jew too. False and misleading information gave rise to hate on campus. I felt extremely unsafe and hid my Magen David necklace, with my grandmother begging me to take it off.

She finished her submission by saying:

I felt no support from my fellow classmates or even fellow Australians. I felt alone in this fight. This is an experience I do not wish on anyone else.

…   …   …

Please help protect us, I am not asking for much, all I want to do is feel safe in my community.

Well, Mia's right. She's not asking for much. She's not asking for much at all. By making that submission to a Senate inquiry she's asking for our help, for the help of everybody in this chamber. Every Australian has the right to feel safe in our country—every single Australian. It's not acceptable that our Jewish community don't feel safe in our country and that they don't feel safe in their homes. It's not right that Jewish schools need to have armed guards. It's not right that students like Mia feel unsafe wearing Jewish symbols out in public. This is not an Australia that I recognise, and it shouldn't be an Australia that anybody recognises—and certainly not one that we accept.

There is a dark irony that those who are so quick to cry racism in this place when it suits them are also the ones that condone or even occasionally whip up menacing behaviour outside of these walls. There is no excuse for antisemitism and there is no place for antisemitism in Australia—period. It is the ultimate form of bigotry. 'Never again is now' is a phrase that was repeated many times at yesterday's rally on the lawns of Parliament House, and there is good reason for that. The parallels between October 7 and the 1930s are chilling. If we don't take a strong stance on antisemitism now, we risk repeating the mistakes of the past. Never again is now.

Journalist Peter Hartcher said it most eloquently when he said:

Australia is a sanctuary from ancient hatreds, not an incubator for them. It begins with respect. For all.

I hope that, yesterday, Jewish Australians everywhere felt that respect from their fellow countrymen. I hope they felt it as thousands of Australians stood shoulder to shoulder with them in solidarity with their grief, willing them to ease the weight of their anguish by sharing their pain.

Yesterday was Australia's opportunity to pay our respects to the memories of the 1,200 innocent people murdered and massacred on October 7, to pray for the hostages that are still held by the terrorist organisation Hamas, to grieve for the families who have lost those dearest to them and to stand in solidarity with our Jewish community so that they can feel a little safer, sleep a little sounder, knowing that the people that they have put here to represent them stand against antisemitism and stand in support of Israel.

Linda Reynolds (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I too rise to speak on this motion and I would like to endorse all of the comments from my colleagues on this side of the chamber. As we reflect on the significance of the one-year anniversary yesterday, on 7 October, one of the things that I've been reflecting very deeply on is the fact that this is not just Israel's war. This is equally Australia's war—and for all of our freedom- and democratic-loving countries.

We don't have to look too far back in our own history to know that democracy is not self-evident and not self-perpetuating. The freedoms that we all enjoy—not just all of us here—have been fought hard for and must continue to be fought for. We have to accept that the impact of this terrible catastrophe that has occurred in Israel is something we have to fight. We have to fight, not just for the rights of Jewish Australians, who are Australians and who deserve all of the protections and freedoms that are accorded to and are expected by all Australians. But what we have seen here in Australia since 7 October last year is turning our nation into something that, sometimes, I can barely recognise. Hatred has been spewed in this chamber, in the media, on our campuses, in some of our communities and in protests in support of listed terrorist organisations and the atrocities they committed on 7 October.

If you listen to some of those opposite, you would think that this was a war and an atrocity that Israel perpetuated. It did not. It was carefully planned and calculated for many years by Hamas. Six months before 7 October, Hamas leader Sinwar was very proud to tell potential donors and supporters that they had been preparing, for years, a big surprise for Israel. They dug at least 150 kilometres of tunnels, going from 30 to 150 feet below Gaza. They built munitions factories underneath Gaza. They built military barracks, tunnels and homes, in essence. They were preparing for war against Israel. How did they fund it? They funded it by diverting aid donations and aid support. They taxed their own people to prepare for war. To prepare for the war that they have unleashed on Israel, they diverted hundreds of millions of dollars from those who needed it most in Gaza.

Those opposite talk about the suffering of the Palestinians. Absolutely, but Israel did not start this; Hamas did. They knew what they were doing. They knew when they unleashed thousands of their soldiers into Israel. They sent them with cameras to murder, to commit a massacre, in the most heinous of all ways. They filmed it and they shared it—women, children. It defies discussion or debate. They did this knowing that Israel would retaliate for this unprovoked attack. They knew the danger that they were putting the Palestinian people in. They knew and they did not care. So please do not think for a second that this was Israel's war to start. This is our war to finish, standing side by side with the Israelis.

One of the things we haven't focused enough on in this chamber is why this is our war. This is not just what is now a kinetic war in the Levant. Australia and our democratic allies are facing an axis, or an alliance, of four nations, Iran, Russia, China and North Korea, who are working together, hand in hand, in ways that we never thought possible. They are helping each other prosecute their own wars and their own fights. Russia in Ukraine is getting significant support from Iran and North Korea, in terms of ballistic missiles and other supports. Iran is using its proxies, Hezbollah, Hamas and the Houthis. They are not just Israel's enemies; they are our enemies as well.

What do they have in common? They all have nuclear capabilities, they exert brutal domestic control on their populations and they have a shared hatred of democracy. Those opposite: if you think that this is not what it is about—it is about helping each other fight each other's wars. We are facing a threat in this country. We have been subject to a gross weaponisation of our social media and our media. How on earth have those opposite been so radicalised? How have our universities turned into hotbeds of antisemitism and hatred, having now turned into unsafe places for thousands of Australian students? How have we got high school students who are chanting 'from the river to the sea'? How many of them actually even know what river and what sea and what it actually means? It is a call for genocide that those opposite are now spouting. How has this happened? How were we not paying more attention to how this radicalisation and how this hatred for democracy, how this hatred for Australian—how is this all happening? We have to start looking at things much more closely and understanding that there is so much more at stake than Israel's sovereignty, its right to exist and its right to defend itself.

Today in this chamber we commemorate and we mourn for the dead and for the hostages. We mourn for what I think is not just a threat to Israel but a threat to our own democracy. This is why all of us in this place and our nation have to look more widely. We have to say that we stand by Israel. We stand by the Australian Jewish community. We will fight for you. We will fight with you because your fight has to be our fight.

Maria Kovacic (NSW, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise in recognition of the anniversary of the October 7 attacks against the State of Israel at the hands of the terrorist group Hamas. October 7 is not a day for celebration. October 7 is not a day to make so-called political arguments. October 7 is a day that will, sadly, live in infamy for the barbaric nature of the attacks that occurred on that day. It was the largest loss of life on a single day for the Jewish people since the Holocaust, one of the darkest chapters of human history.

Just over one year ago today, at dawn, thousands of terrorists in Gaza, which Israel has not occupied since 2005, poured over the border fence by motorbike, by car, by foot and even by paraglider. They did so not in the endeavour of self-determination and not in the endeavour of statehood. They did so in an act of unrelenting violence. They did so with clear contempt for human life. They did so without discrimination of combatant or civilian, of adult or child. They did so in an attempt to inflict as much death and injury as was possible before an Israeli response could occur. Above all, they did so in an attempt to inflict as much terror on the Israeli people as they possibly could. In the first 20 minutes of the attack, some 5,000 rockets roared over the border into Israel. They were unguided rockets with no specific target—not military installations, no specific target. So long as they resulted in the death of any Israeli man, woman or child, Hamas, a terrorist organisation, would see success.

At the same time, some 6,000 terrorists poured through newly exploded holes in the border fence. They crossed into Israel and ravaged its border kibbutzim and towns. They ravaged them in a way that the modern world has rarely seen. We all saw the footage that was then turned into propaganda for terrorist organisations and posted all over social media, gloating to the world of the deaths of thousands of civilians in their homes, at the breakfast table, at the bus stop and in the street.

October 7 will forever be remembered as one of the darkest days in our history and an example of the worst of our humanity. We must remember what happened, and we can't forget. We can't make excuses for it. Those that seek to make this day about something else do so without the fulsome recognition of the real atrocities that occurred. They do so without uttering the fundamental cause of the attack—antisemitism.

I recall, in the aftermath of the attack a year ago, I attended a vigil with the Jewish Australian community in Dover Heights in Sydney. It was deeply moving, and it mourned the loss of life. The Jewish Australian community was joined by so many others wishing to express their thoughts at such a very difficult time. I listened to some powerful speeches from the Premier of New South Wales, Chris Minns, and from the Leader of the Opposition, Peter Dutton. They were speeches which spoke to everything that is good about our country.

At the same time, others were using the days immediately after the attack, before Israel had responded, to organise their own rallies. They were not rallies mourning the dead or those that were kidnapped. They were not peaceful rallies; they were rallies filled with antisemitic chants. They marched from town hall down to our opera house in Sydney and put their vile, racist and antisemitic diatribe on display for the whole world to see. In our country, Australia, we saw intolerance and hate and we saw people celebrating the pain of others.

Yesterday we saw other groups in Sydney using the anniversary of the largest massacre of the Jewish people since the Holocaust, October 7, as a day to demonstrate and protest. There are 364 other days in the year to protest. Why did they need to choose that one day? To inflict further pain—was that the reason?

I condemn, in the strongest possible terms, antisemitism and racism in all its forms. We cannot accept that in this country. We cannot look the other way, and we cannot allow for it to be normalised in Australia. The standard we walk past is the standard that we will end up accepting.

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

I welcome the opportunity to speak on this motion to acknowledge and remember the victims of the appalling October 7 terror attacks, all of the families of those victims and, of course, the hostages who have been held for 366 agonising days by a terrorist group determined to prolong the human suffering they have caused and continue to cause. The terrorism of Hamas, supported and funded by the Islamic Republic of Iran, was not resistance, nor should it be associated with any other form of justification that some have tried to create. It was the mass murder of innocent civilians. That is what we mean, and what the vast majority of Australians mean, when we say we unequivocally condemn the Hamas terrorist attack on Israel on October 7 last year—unequivocally, meaning we do not need to add to the end of that statement some sort of mealy-mouthed criticism of Israel and its legitimate right to defend itself or take action against the terrorist groups and their funders and backers in Iran, who try every single day to fire rockets and missiles into Israel to kill more Israelis. This is not the behaviour of any rational or reasonable actor; this is the behaviour of terrorists committed to murder and depravity because of an evil, deeply antisemitic ideology.

On October 7 last year, the terrorists, rapists and murderers who broke a ceasefire and invaded Israel did not seek out military targets; they sought out innocent, unarmed, defenceless women and children, mothers and fathers, grandparents and grandchildren. They took an evil, disgusting joy in the murders and sexual violence that they were carrying out. Some of the terrorists called home to boast about the Jews that they were murdering. Others filmed and documented the massacre. By any reasonable person, the abhorrent behaviour of Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and everybody else involved in the October 7 terrorist attack is unequivocally condemned. More than 1,200 innocent people were murdered in cold blood, hundreds were taken captive and many are yet to be returned. There is no greater evidence that Hamas and the Islamic Republic of Iran want that violence to continue, and continue to escalate, than the fact that they have refused to release those hostages.

Just as the actions of Hamas terrorists on October 7 were incomprehensibly abhorrent and shocking, so too have we been disgusted to see here in Australia, in our own country, people who choose to celebrate that terrorism, who claimed that October 7 was a great victory and who used it as an opportunity to chant antisemitic slogans and seek to intimidate Jewish Australians. This disgraceful behaviour has no place in this country, and it is disgusting that it has been allowed to become so normalised that we have seen some in Australia choose yesterday, 7 October, and the lead-up to that date as a chance to push their own divisive and dangerous views even further and to wave flags and show symbols of support for terrorist groups such as Hezbollah. October 7 was an appalling tragedy, but so too is it an appalling tragedy that some in our society saw the footage of that terrorist attack and decided that they sympathise not with the innocent victims of that attack but with the Hamas and Hezbollah terrorists.

I was proud yesterday to stand with members of the Australian Jewish community on the lawns of this Parliament House to share their pain and their frustration at the events of October 7. Yesterday, we remembered all of those who lost their lives to terror on that tragic day and all of those hostages who remain in captivity. We were joined by people from all walks of life and all backgrounds, including members of our incredible Australian Iranian community, who, I know, know all too well the pain and suffering that is inflicted on innocent people by the Islamic Republic of Iran regime.

It is disappointing that the government, in the other place, today would not accept or agree to the opposition's proposed changes to ensure that this motion could be supported on a bipartisan basis; focus specifically on the victims of October 7, their families and the hostages who are still held; and call out those who are to blame for all of the human suffering that occurred that day and every day since—the suffering that is caused by Hamas, by Hezbollah, by the IRI regime and by all of those who support and run cover for them.

Slade Brockman (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I too rise to associate myself with the remarks of all my colleagues on this side, particularly the very moving contributions from Senator Chandler, who just spoke, and also Senator McGrath, who spoke earlier and read into the Hansard record the names of those hostages taken and still sadly unaccounted for and whose fate is unknown and whose families must be feeling such ongoing pain as a result of that massive uncertainty and trauma. I know every right-thinking person would feel that same trauma and that same horror at the events that unfolded just over a year ago.

The fact that we came into this place in May of this year and the vast majority of this chamber unequivocally condemned the use of the phrase 'from the river to the sea' is something that it seems we have forgotten very quickly, because we have seen it used today on multiple occasions by an elected member of this place, which I think is a great shame. It's a great shame to this chamber and a great shame to Australia. We have seen it chanted in rallies celebrating the events on that terrible day just over a year ago. But I know that certainly all those on this side of the chamber and my colleagues stand with the vast majority of right-thinking Australians, with the Jewish community of Australia and with Israel. I stand against terrorism in all its forms.

Dean Smith (WA, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Competition, Charities and Treasury) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Last night Australians joined Jewish communities at candlelight vigils for the victims of the October 7 terrorist attacks—those who lost their lives, those taken hostage and those they have left behind to live in mourning and fear. I was honoured to join the Israeli ambassador, His Excellency Mr Amir Maimon, colleagues and friends at the Israeli embassy here in Canberra. It was a solemn and deeply moving experience for us all, as it was for those attending events across Australia, including in my home state of Western Australia, whose Jewish community I know and value so well. We prayed last night for a safe return of hostages taken in the attacks. We prayed for peace in a region where it's so desperately needed. We prayed for strength in the face of ongoing danger and uncertainty for so many in Israel, in Australia and around the world. We remembered the tragic loss of more than 1,200 people—men, women, children and the elderly, all of them innocent victims—and we stood united in our unequivocal rejection of terrorism as a means of securing political outcomes.

On 7 October 2023 was the single deadliest loss of Jewish lives since the Holocaust. A year on, it is as disturbing now as it was then. The world was supposed to have relegated bloodshed like this to the history books. We were supposed to have left antisemitic violence and hatred like this behind us. Instead, the world took a devastating step backwards 12 months ago when Hamas militants crossed the border and committed unimaginable atrocity. People were gunned down in a music festival and in their homes. They were beaten, assaulted and snatched away to be held as hostages. This was not a theatre of war or a strike targeting military assets; it was a hate crime, a murderous rampage against people who had a right to live in peace and security.

For the families who have had loved ones killed, there is a feeling of loss that remains very raw. Those who are dead should be here with us today. Their lives were stolen by Hamas and its depraved ideology and opportunism. We mourn their loss. For the relatives and friends of those held in Gaza, there is an incomprehensible sense of dread and despair over the dangers those hostages remain in. Many of the people living in the invaded kibbutzim were humanitarian workers or Israeli citizens who were otherwise compassionate for the issues affecting civilians in Gaza. Residents in the town of Be'eri, for example, organised programs that transported Gazan medical patients to hospitals in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv. Palestinians worked in Be'eri's fields and local businesses. They were neighbours, but this meant nothing to Hamas. Their homes were burnt down and their lives were taken all the same.

The victims of 7 October and the broader Jewish world have also suffered intense fear for the future: the future of Israel, the future of the Middle East and, indeed, the future of Jews everywhere. The fear is that the antisemitism of the past has returned, and is at a level we haven't witnessed for over 80 years. What is most confronting of all is that we are seeing hatred of Jewish people here, in our own Australian communities. We're seeing it on the streets of our major cities, in our universities and on social media. It must be called out without fail, and we will continue to do so. This is unacceptable, it is deplorable and it is indefensible. It is also un-Australian. Nobody in this nation should go through what our Jewish communities are going through. No Australian should live in fear of their fellow citizens or doubt that they belong in their homes, their schools or their workplaces. I should not hear from frightened Jewish constituents in Perth under ongoing threat as they worship or collect their children from Jewish schools.

This country was intended by them, as it was by all our forebears, to be a safe haven—a place where citizens could live in harmony and mutual support, regardless of ethnicity or religion. Our values and loyalties are tested at times like these, and it cannot be a test that we, as Australians, fail. A year on, we, with the Jewish people of Australia, must remain in opposition to all forms of anti-Jewish hate, setting a positive example of tolerance and understanding to others not only in our own country but also around the world.

But there was also another theme that emerged last night. It was that, despite these endemic feelings of disbelief, fear and grief, hope does remain. Last night, at a vigil attended by the opposition leader, Mr Dutton, among others, David Ossip, the president of the New South Wales Jewish Board of Deputies, said of Jewish people: 'Resilience runs through our veins.' It is impossible to disagree with this claim. Resilience is the hallmark of the Jewish people—a characteristic of people who have bravely endured a history of persecution. It is a testament to this that, despite this history, the people of Israel live. They are faced with ongoing hatred and discrimination, with remarkable personal loss and with living with security challenges we cannot fathom, but a year on from the events of October 7, the people of Israel continue to live.

As I did last night, I will continue to pray for the safe release of the hostages, the defeat of those who risk the future of Israel and humanity—Hamas, Hezbollah and the Houthis—and a long-overdue and lasting peace for those who deserve it. I pray for Jewish people here in Australia and, indeed, for all Australians. I pray that we remember the values that define us and which should ensure we live in harmony with and with respect for each other always.

Hollie Hughes (NSW, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Mental Health and Suicide Prevention) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I also rise today to stand in solidarity with the people of Israel in commemoration of one of the worst pogroms perpetuated against innocent civilians in a single day since the Holocaust. I honour the innocent civilians in Israel who daily live in fear in a hostile region full of hate-filled people who want to see them eradicated in their entirety. I weep for the hostages who were taken, beaten, tortured, raped and brutally murdered, never to see families again, simply because they were Jewish. I celebrate those who were liberated and released, and we will keep in our prayers the hostages who are yet to be released. My heart breaks for the great loss of life that war and conflict bring. Explosives do not discriminate between civilians and militants; that is the cost of war. But Hamas does discriminate and Hezbollah does discriminate, so let's not forget what led us here. And for all those who show bitter concern for the innocents caught up in the conflict, I can hear their deafening silence in the face of these barbaric acts committed on Israeli soil.

There is the hypocrisy of those in this country who dare to upset our civil system of tolerance and respect to bring hatred across the sea to our diverse landscape and, in doing so, threaten to upend our peace and security in the process. These are the people who protest so-called genocide in one breath and then cheer the firing of rockets in another because they now flow the other way. There are those who claim to be critical of the Zionist regime purely so they can veil their antisemitism. There are people who have fled to Australia for peace, prosperity and freedom who challenge this way of life by imposing their brand of hate speech and intimidation on anyone who dares to criticise them. How has this been allowed to continue in this country over the past 12 months? Simply, it has been a lack of leadership from this Prime Minister, a mealy-mouthed approach that even today has seen him speaking out of both sides of his mouth. It would have been nice if the government had stepped up and been decisive, if it had taken a zero-tolerance approach on this issue. It was not our fight but it is becoming our fight as a result of this unfettered vitriol that has been permitted to proliferate.

We cannot forget the damage that UNRWA has done. The United Nations organisation has used money from Western nations including our own to radicalise and propagandise impressionable children in the Middle East to grow up with a hatred and dislike of Jews. I have spoken about UNRWA and its disgraceful behaviour in the past in this place. This is an organisation that employed terrorist sympathisers. It employed someone who even went so far as to pray that Hitler would return because his job was not finished.

This is a history of tensions between neighbours going back thousands of years that we do not have time to go into today, but we need to remember we would not be standing here today one year and one day on from October 7 if Hamas and, by association, Hezbollah and Iran had not broken the ceasefire, if they had they not attacked innocent young people at a music festival, families living in a kibbutz near the Gazan border, not only torturing them, raping them. As we saw last night at a vigil held at the Israeli embassy, it was not just murder that occurred; it was something even more than that. There is silence from those who know that many of these innocent, unarmed civilians were beheaded, and their heads were placed on the freeway where people were trying to escape. People were having to zig-zag along the road to avoid hitting heads that had been placed there by terrorists. Terrorists wearing GoPros were posting this footage to their social media and proudly sharing with their families back home in Gaza how many Jews they had killed, how many women and children they had raped and tortured. It is beyond barbaric. It is not the behaviour of anyone with a drop of humanity in them.

Then there is the fact that those who sympathise with the plight of these murderers—and, unfortunately, some of them are in this place—could not restrain themselves to allow for one day of mourning. They could not allow the Jewish people, the Jewish community in Australia, and, in fact, all decent Australians, to commemorate, to remember what had occurred on October 7, when over 1,200 people were brutally murdered and when 240 hostages were taken. One hundred and one hostages are still being held, and they're not being held in military installations. They're not being held with access to the Red Cross. They're being held in tunnels that Hamas built under schools and hospitals as it cowardly hides amongst its civilians, using them as human shields.

The intolerable and disgraceful behaviour of these groups knows no bounds. Yet those that appear to support Hamas and Hezbollah and appear to support the actions of Iran and the eradication of Israel, who declare 'from the river to the sea'—and I would challenge most of them to know what river or sea they're talking about—the fact that they continue on this disgraceful campaign against Israel is just beyond words. It is just extraordinary to hear any Israeli or Jewish person being referred to as a coloniser.

Acting Deputy President McGrath, you and I were in Israel together. We walked along one of the roads, which they are currently excavating around, that they think is the path along which Jesus most likely carried the cross. To see where thousands of years ago Jesus, himself a Jew, was supposed to have walked, to read in the Bible the story of the Israelites, going back thousands of years—there are those who so misunderstand history, whether ancient or modern, who refer to Israel as colonisers and who deny their right to exist. It is, in fact, very much their homeland. That is no better illustrated than by the location of Al Aqsa, which was built on top of the Temple Mount, on top of former Jewish temples. It is not the Jews that were the late arrivals in this land.

I also want to acknowledge—and it breaks my heart every time I think about them—the two Bibas children, Kfir and Ariel. Kfir recently marked his first birthday in captivity. Nobody knows if he is still alive, but this baby has now spent more time in captivity than at home on the kibbutz where he had been living and from where he had been so violently taken. The fact that this morning we saw in the other place the inability to have a bipartisan motion and acknowledgement of 7 October is a sad indictment on this country's Prime Minister and a divergence from the position of all Labor prime ministers that stood strongly with Israel and that understood the importance of our partnership and friendship with Israel. Yet this Prime Minister, with his cheap political pointscoring, perhaps because he's worried about seats in south-west Sydney, is prepared to undermine decades of bipartisanship, during which everyone, as parties of government, has recognised the importance of our relationship with Israel and the fact that, in an area of great volatility, it is a friend who best reflects our own democratic way of life.

The fact is that the Prime Minister is more interested in playing political games than standing up for the Jewish community, and the Jewish community know it. Really, Prime Minister, just stop pretending, because you are actually unable to stand up for not only Israel but, in particular, the Jewish Australian community. We know that they don't feel safe, and that breaks my heart. That is unacceptable.

It is unacceptable that people who came to this country looking for peace and stability—many of them now second and third generation; their grandparents were Holocaust survivors—feel unsafe and would prefer to return to Israel, which is under a barrage of missile attacks. They feel more safe there than they do here, with the antisemitism that is currently running through our community and is on full display in south-west Sydney and, more importantly and, I think, more despairingly, is on full display at so many of our universities—which are supposed to be places of higher learning, yet are now just hotbeds of antisemitism. It is absolutely disgraceful.

The Holocaust didn't start with the gas chambers. I would implore all of you who did not study modern history—or those of you who did and it has somehow slipped out of your minds—to remember that, because what is happening now is in so many ways almost repeating what happened in the lead-up to World War II, such as Kristallnacht. You can look at the way that things have been and the attacks that have occurred on Jewish communities, Jewish businesses and Jewish schools and the fact that aged-care homes have to have armed guards securing them. We know schools do. It is absolutely appalling.

I do want to commend those Australians who have stood up and been counted and stood alongside our Jewish fellow citizens. There are people, and a lot of us, who support you here in this country. Yesterday, at the Never Again is Now rally down on the Parliament House lawn, it was interesting to hear—I think that this is an important message for people to hear, and I've been guilty of saying it as well—that the silent majority of Australians stand strong with the Jewish community and support the Jewish community and are not antisemitic. But the time for being the silent majority is over. The time for silence is over. It is time to speak up and say that this is not acceptable, that this is not the country we live in and that this is not behaviour that is appropriate for Australia. But it is not appropriate behaviour towards any group of fellow citizens, whoever they are.

We know what happens up the end of the chamber, with their undergraduate stunts and lack of understanding or ability to recognise what has actually occurred and how this started. But I do want to say that I stand with the Australian Jewish community. I honour them. How they have been treated is appalling. They deserved the right to mark a day of mourning unimpeded by protest. For myself—maybe not for many or all of us in this place—I apologise that there wasn't leadership from the government. Neither on 7 October last year nor onwards has there been leadership that has stopped the appalling behaviour of these protesters, who have been intimidating you on what should have been a very, very solemn day or remembrance.

Kerrynne Liddle (SA, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Child Protection and the Prevention of Family Violence) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Imagine attending university, which should be a place of wonder and learning, but instead being met with chants of 'death to Israel' and even 'death to Australia'. That's what Jewish students endured at a meeting questioning an article, published by the University of Adelaide's student magazine, that ended with: 'The solution to achieving peace and bringing forth justice for Palestine is to demand the abolition of Israel. Free Palestine and death to Israel.' That's pretty clear, pretty ugly, vile stuff.

This week the former editor of the university's magazine led a pro-Palestine rally in Adelaide, continuing that vile commentary that is never acceptable—not ever and not on Australian soil. In Australia we enjoy the privilege of living in a democracy where we have the gift of many, many freedoms. We must value that and hold that close to us, never ceding the concept of freedom and never letting it fray at the edges. There is no place for the promotion of terrorist organisations, not on our university campuses, not on the steps of our South Australian parliament, not here in Canberra, not anywhere.

When students held an unauthorised four-week pro-Palestinian encampment on the Adelaide campus in May this year, my instinct was that university is a place of learning; it's not a campsite. So the decision to move them on should have been an easy one. That should have happened immediately. Every Australian should rightly shudder at accounts of Adelaide students about life on campus, as conveyed in submissions to a Senate inquiry. A first-year Jewish student at the University of Adelaide recounted: 'It has become a place, like most other places in the world, where we are othered. I most likely speak for most of our Jewish students when I say this is not a place where I can feel proud of my faith or even the smallest bit comfortable to make it known.' People hiding their own identity—how tragic in Australia, in our free country.

As a graduate of the University of Adelaide and a governing council member, I think this is a deeply disturbing reflection on an experience at a place of intellectual inquiry and learning, not of fear, intimidation and exclusion. In a submission to the committee inquiry into the Commission of Inquiry into Antisemitism at Australian Universities Bill 2024, an Adelaide mother explained being scared for her daughter who had decided, for her own mental health, to attend campus only when absolutely necessary. This is not just happening on campuses. It is also happening in the wider community—on the streets, in clubs and in shops. We must reflect on the kind of Australia we want. We should demand zero tolerance for any support of terrorism or any attempt to indoctrinate children or our young minds at universities.

Contributing to the failure to crack down on antisemitism is the failure of this Prime Minister to address this with clarity and conviction. In October and November 2023, there was a 738 per cent increase in the number of reported antisemitic incidents in Australia compared to the two months one year earlier. Never Again is Now organiser Mark Leach told me yesterday, at a vigil here at Parliament House, that there had been a 1,000 per cent increase in antisemitism since 7 October. In the year since Jews faced the most murderous slaughter since the Holocaust, the opponents of Israel have denied charges of racism by insisting: 'I'm not antisemitic. I'm not anti-Zionist. I don't hate Jews. I hate their state.'

Terrorism has no boundaries, and we should give it no room, no space, no oxygen. I know people who've seen images from 7 October, from body cameras worn by those terrorists, but I don't need to see it to appreciate the scale of the horror that was endured on that day. I hope everyone in Australia never has to endure that. What Australia needs is strong leadership, and that's what a coalition government would provide, restoring moral clarity and acting with moral courage. We condemn Hamas's terrorist attacks on Israel on October 7, which killed more than 1,200 innocent Israelis. We mourn all impacted by these heinous acts. We call out the terrorists, we call out hatred and we will use the full force of our democratic institutions, our laws and this parliament to do that. And we should.

Jacinta Nampijinpa Price (NT, Country Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Indigenous Australians) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the government's motion regarding the October 7 attacks committed by Hamas. Yesterday we marked 12 months since the horrific and inexcusable attack by Hamas, an abhorrent militant group, on the democratic nation of Israel and its people. We remembered those lives that were lost; their families, who will never be the same again; and those who are yet to be returned and remain hostages. This is a disappointing motion by the Albanese labour government. It is an abandonment by the Prime Minister of a bipartisan approach to these issues. The Prime Minister has consistently failed over the last 12 months to take a strong stance or show of support for Israel and the Jewish community. It is that failure to lead well that has caused so much antisemitism to take root in this country. We know where antisemitism can lead. History has shown us that. That's why this is not a matter on which the Prime Minister can afford to be on the fence.

Hamas, Hezbollah and these evil militants must be condemned in the strongest of terms. Domestic political gain should not be a factor in Australia's response or condemnation of these groups. Unfortunately, we have seen Anthony Albanese and his Labor government prioritising their chances of election success at the expense of supporting the nation of Israel. I've said it before and I will say it again: the Prime Minister must visit Israel. He must go to these sites and come face to face with the evil that was committed. Following the worst attack on the Jewish people since the Nazi Holocaust, he must lead by example and see the atrocities committed against its people.

In March of this year I had the solemn and sobering privilege of visiting Israel. I visited those sites, walked the pathways of those who are no longer with us. Let me tell you: it is absolutely harrowing. There's no other way to describe it. We can't even imagine in our own country what it is like to send our preschoolers to school and to teach them to find safety should they hear sirens or hear rocket fire. Our children freely attend preschool and aren't subject to having to understand what this means. We don't have to send our high school students, once they graduate, to the military to learn how to defend our nation. We don't have borders that are lined with enemies that would prefer to see our destruction, to see us eliminated from the face of the earth. As a mother of four sons of my own, I cannot imagine seeing them on their days off, should they have to be enlisted by the military, to walk the streets, to patrol the streets, to ensure the safety of their community. We live a luxurious life in this country and we must not forget that, but we must not allow it to make us complacent in the face of the horrific antisemitism that we're seeing.

I viewed the footage of innocent Israelis being attacked brutally, utterly brutally, with pure evil intent by members of Hamas. I can tell you that those images stay with you. They never leave your mind. They bring back a feeling in the pit of my stomach—one that I can't shake.

Young children, some of the most vulnerable members of our population, who should never have to think about terrorism, let alone be in the midst of it—children just like that—were awoken by the sound of rocket fire and gunfire. I watched the footage of them running to their garden bomb shelter with their father, thinking that they were safe. Just as they think they are safe from attacks from the air, it proves to be a murderous, cold-blooded ground assault, with a grenade being thrown into the safe room and blowing their father, who tried to save their lives by diving on top of them, to pieces.

I saw slightly older teenagers and young adults, the same age as my sons, being hunted down and killed as they drove up to roadblocks. I imagined my own sons in that situation. Teenage girls huddled together in a shelter, scared because of the rocket fire going on above them. A Hamas terrorist then appeared in the shelter, and the girls looked at each other in confusion: 'Who is this man with this gun?' The next thing is those young teenage girls lying dead on the floor of that shelter, surrounded by gloating terrorists from Hamas. There is no place for supporters of terror in this country. There is no place for supporters of those who would snuff out the lives of teenage girls, who would rape and murder them. How can those images possibly ever leave your mind once you see that? For those survivors who are still alive, that is burned into their minds. It's made all the more deplorable, of course, by the footage of those Hamas militants rejoicing and calling them Jewish pigs—that is what they call them—and claiming that that was their role in the name of Allah.

The events of October 7 were an absolute massacre, not an act of self-defence. There is no excuse for them and no explanation other than pure evil and terrorism. Fanatical terrorists who are driven by evil ideology are not interested in a two-state solution. They are not interested in a peaceful co-existence of Israel and Palestine. They do not want an end to the war. They do not want a ceasefire or peaceful negotiations. They demonstrate that at every turn. They want the total destruction of the Jewish people. They want Israel wiped from the face of the earth.

Let's not forget that, within Israel's borders, it is not only Jewish people who live in a peaceful democracy; it is Arab Muslims, Christians and atheists living peacefully. Hamas and the terrorists want them all gone. They don't just want the Jewish people of Israel gone; they want them all gone. They want the Arab Muslims gone. They want the Christians gone. They want the atheists gone. They want the whole of Israel wiped off the face of the earth.

These terrorists are indoctrinated right from childhood that martyrdom is the ultimate accomplishment in life. For Hamas, death in pursuit of its cause, even the death of its own civilians, is praised. Hamas doesn't care about humanity, and that was completely evident by the footage that I saw. It puts no value on human life. It uses citizens, children and civilians, as human shields, and then it relies on the goodwill and even the ignorance of the rest of the world to clean up its own mess. Further to that, it relies on the goodwill and the ignorance of others to continue to pursue its agenda of terrorism and the annihilation of the Jewish people.

It has relied on the naivety of the West, and we are seeing the devastating consequences of that with the incredible rise of antisemitism in this country. The progressive Left have been more than willing to do the bidding of this terrorist organisation, and it is an indictment on the Albanese government that they too are buying into it. The Prime Minister must demonstrate to the world that Australia will not stand idly by, ambivalent to the creeping indifference of the world towards the ultimate goals of Hamas and its evil partners.

Israel must always be supported in its right to exist as a nation. We, as a nation, must not continue the work of the Nazis in the form of Hamas, Hezbollah and their evil allies. We must all stand up and say no. We must all stand up for the Jewish members of our own community. Similar to the responses that we saw during the war on terror when it was suggested that we do not subject the Muslim community to Islamophobia, we must not subject the Jewish people of our community to antisemitism. There is no place in Australia for antisemitism. It was the same when the tension between our nation and China took hold not so long ago. We were told we do not target the Chinese people. We condemn the Chinese government, the CCP, but we do not target Chinese people or people of Chinese heritage in our country, so we do not do this to the Jewish people of this country.

We stamp out antisemitism. We do not encourage it. We learn from world history. There is no room for ambivalence in this fight, and Israel need us as their allies in the West to stand with them now more than ever. It is true this fight is not just a fight for Israel; it is a fight for the free world, for democracy. They are the final bastion of hope, and we must stand with them. If we ignore this—you can believe it—we will be next.

Let me remind you, Hamas, Hezbollah, the terrorist organisations, are not interested in humanity. With whatever humanity we have as a nation, we must stand together with Israel.

Richard Colbeck (Tasmania, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to make my contribution to this motion, a motion which should be devoted to the commemoration of events in Israel on October 7. It's that simple. It should not be that difficult in this place to devote one motion to acknowledging and condemning those horrific, barbaric, inhumane actions perpetrated in Israel on October 7 last year. That is not to diminish the impact of the resulting conflict on all of those who are being affected. The thousands of lives lost and the thousands more directly and indirectly impacted can, and should, be acknowledged. This entire conflict and all of us impacted are to be lamented. Who in their right mind would want this? I think that all of us in this place want to live our lives in peace, and we seek that for all communities globally.

I reflect on the words of Israel's ambassador to Australia, Amir Maimon, last night at the ceremony commemorating the loss of life on October 7 last year and the words he has repeated a number of times over the last year: 'We did not want this war. We do not ask for this war.' That brings me back to the question of a few moments ago: who in their right mind would want this? It seems the only ones who want this are Hamas, Hezbollah, Houthi—Iran. Why do they want this? Because they want to complete the attempted genocide of the Israeli people, the extermination of the State of Israel. Senators come into this place talking of genocide yet ignore the reality that they campaign against the people who have been the subject of an attempted genocide—the Jewish Israeli people, people whose government have rightly vowed that such an attempted genocide will not happen again. We, as a parliament, should stand with the Israeli government to ensure that such an attempted genocide can never happen again.

How is it that our country has forgotten the lessons of that attempted genocide? How is it that antisemitism has grown to such an extent in this great country? How was it that antisemitism runs rife through our universities and our communities? How is it that Jewish people don't feel safe in this country? And how is it that this parliament can't devote one motion to the memory of October 7? This is not the Australian way. All of us in this place seek peace in the Middle East. All of us want to see the release of the remaining 101 hostages. Yet, we can't devote a single motion to the commemoration of the evil events perpetrated a year ago: the mass murder of innocent civilians—women, children—indiscriminately, deliberately slaughtered. Young people enjoying a concert, parents and grandparents going about their daily lives—101 hostages taken and tortured, continuing to be held. These actions—disgracefully, shamefully celebrated by Hamas, Hezbollah, Houthi, Iran and their sympathisers—are actions that none of us can reasonably claim to comprehend. They can only be condemned in the strongest possible terms.

Last night, thousands attended vigils around this country in support of the Jewish people and the people of Israel. We listened to the profound stories of those who lost family friends and of community members who still wait for the release of the hostages. We prayed for peace. We prayed for the release of those hostages. Here in Canberra, we appreciated the words of commemoration from Senator O'Neill and, particularly, from Senator Sharma. We heard of the determination of the Israeli people to be able to live peacefully in their communities—something, surely, we can all aspire to. It's something that this parliament should have been able to devote one motion to.

I support the amendments to this motion proposed by Senator Birmingham, standing in support of the Israeli people as they commemorate the largest loss of life of their people since the terrible events in the attempted genocide of World War II.

Sarah Henderson (Victoria, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Education) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to commemorate the one-year anniversary of the horrific terrorist attacks carried out by Hamas on 7 October last year, claiming the lives of more than 1,200 innocent Israelis. It was a brutal and unprovoked assault on civilians, the deadliest day for Jews since the Holocaust. It is a tragedy which continues to reverberate through the Jewish community, here in Australia and around the world. Today, we remember the victims and we stand resolutely against the forces of terror and terrorists.

We all saw the gut-wrenching vision: terrorists parachuting into a music festival, where those who were there to enjoy the music were hunted down, brutally tortured and murdered—some 360 in total. We saw the footage of people scrambling across open fields, desperate to escape. Cars were peppered with bullet holes, abandoned with doors opened and bodies burnt beyond recognition. Then there were stories from the many Jewish communities which border Gaza, where the early morning was shattered by this heinous attack. There were screams from the innocent Israelis as they were dragged from their homes, shot or stabbed to death in front of family members. Others were filmed as they were brutalised then pulled into the back of vehicles and driven back across the border.

Today, it's reported that over 60 hostages and the remains of over 30 hostages—these numbers are very unclear—are still being held in Gaza at the hands of Hamas, a terror group committed to one cause: the complete destruction of Israel and the Jewish people.

Israel was at the centre of Hamas's evil last year, but the shockwaves of the terrorist attack resonated around the world. That day of depravity—as I say, the greatest loss of Jewish life in a single day since the Holocaust—awoke and exposed an antisemitic rot afflicting Western democracies, including tragically here in this country. Last night, I was privileged to be amongst some 5,000 people at an incredible gathering in Melbourne to commemorate October 7. It was a profoundly moving evening and an opportunity for deep reflection, to mourn and to grieve. It was underlined by the continuing impact this horrendous attack and the subsequent alarming rise in antisemitism across Melbourne and across this country has had on Jewish Australians and on Australians across the board.

Zionism Victoria president Yossi Goldfarb did not pull his punches when he called out the inaction of the Albanese government. He said:

We have seen darkness in Australia.

Darkness underpinned by virulent and dangerous anti-Semitism that is, in the view of our community, simply out of control, a threat to everything that makes our country unique and great.

There is a permissiveness that has let anti-Semitism fester. A permissiveness encouraged by weak and ambiguous expositions of our foreign policy that, in our community's view, have weakened our social cohesion, leaving us to feel that the state of Israel has been abandoned as a natural ally of the Australian people.

The roar from the crowd in response to those words was incredible. The Jewish people of this country largely feel betrayed by this government.

As the shadow minister for education I have been very proud to stand shoulder to shoulder with Jewish students and staff from universities and with Jewish students attending Jewish schools and their families. We know the stories, and they are deeply traumatising. As we heard in the Senate inquiry on the bill to establish a commission of inquiry into antisemitism at Australian universities, Jewish students are saying that they have been forced, since October last year, to choose between their safety and their education. That is completely untenable. Students are staying at home. They are too afraid to go to university. They are hiding in the shadows. They are not wearing the symbols of their faith for fear of intimidation, vilification and all the other horrendous things that have happened on university campuses which we have exposed over many months.

Earlier today in the other place, opposition leader Mr Dutton raised deep concerns after he sought to work with the Prime Minister on a motion that would have unequivocally condemned Hamas and honoured those murdered a year ago. As Mr Dutton stated, Mr Albanese opted to go it alone, continuing to speak from both sides of his mouth. But it's a familiar narrative. This is a government which has turned its back on its own antisemitism envoy. Before our committee to establish a commission of inquiry, which was so brilliantly prosecuted by the member for Berowra in his private member's bill in the other place, the antisemitism envoy urged that a judicial inquiry be established. She identified that antisemitism at universities was so embedded and so systemic that anything less was not good enough.

Throughout the inquiry, we heard stories of despair after children were allowed onto the University of Sydney campus, where they chanted, 'Intifada,' and, 'From the river to the sea.' I will say that the minister has now essentially apologised because of these statements, but he initially said that chants such as these meant different things to different people, and that caused enormous distress to many Australian Jews. Of course, we had a situation at the University of Sydney where members of Hizb ut-Tahrir infiltrated the campus. We called on the Albanese government and the minister to conduct a full investigation into to how this could have happened and how the vice-chancellor's office knew about this for weeks and did nothing, when these people were menacing and terrorising students and staff. Yet that investigation never happened. Whatever may have been raised in private, the Minister for Education never said anything publicly, and I remain stunned by that decision.

It is absolutely essential that we see zero tolerance of antisemitism on university campuses, just as it is absolutely essential that we see zero tolerance of antisemitism in every corner of this country. Even after we handed down our dissenting report calling for a commission of inquiry, we've now seen other stories that Jewish students have raised about what has happened on university campuses, including a Jewish student who raised complaints about some shocking slogans that were being yelled at Deakin University in relation to Zionists. The family of that student is deeply concerned that appropriate action was not taken.

There was an academic at the University of New South Wales—and this happened only in the last couple of weeks—who was giving a speech to pro-Palestinian supporters or protesters and said, 'Our job is to make Jews feel very uncomfortable.' This was recorded on video at the University of New South Wales. I have been advised that the university is taking this very seriously, but this incident happened just in the last few weeks.

I do want to thank Monash University and acknowledge its efforts. There was an event scheduled by the Monash University Islamic Society, a fundraising dinner that was scheduled to coincide with the first anniversary of October 7. That was scheduled for last night. I am very pleased that when I raised my deep concerns with the university's vice-chancellor, Professor Pickering, the university took action and prohibited that event from going ahead.

I'm very proud to be part of a coalition led by Mr Dutton, who has a clear conviction about the importance of standing with Israel and with Jewish Australians. Jewish Australians understand that, to do so, you need the moral courage and clarity of your convictions, and we have seen that in spades from Mr Dutton, who has been unwavering in his support for Israel and in his efforts to forge a united and bipartisan response from this parliament. As Yossi Goldfarb so powerfully stated last night, we cannot allow permissiveness to let antisemitism fester in our society. We proudly stand firm in our support for Israel, for Jewish Australians and for the peace and security that we all cherish and that Jewish Australians and all Jews around the world so deserve.

Matt O'Sullivan (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I think we can all agree that the October 7 attack on Israel by Hamas was not only a tragedy but a stark reminder of the fragility of peace and the price of freedom. Events like these shake us to our core, reminding us that freedom and security do not come by accident—nor are they guaranteed. Just as Australia cherishes its own freedoms, we are reminded today that we must make active choices to defend these values, not just within our borders but also by standing with our allies.

The world saw, on that terrible day just over 12 months ago, the dangers posed by those who seek to undermine peace through terror. October 7 was the single deadliest day for Israelis and Jews since the Holocaust. Let us be clear about the horrors that unfolded on that day. As dawn broke and some families slept in their rooms, the terrorist group Hamas brutally and indiscriminately slaughtered more than 1,200 innocent men, women and children. The attack was deliberate, calculating, and resembled evil that the world has seen raised too often against this Jewish homeland. They were burned, shot and tortured in their homes, at the music festival, during a morning walk, all while desperately trying to escape their attackers. Hamas perpetuated violence upon the State of Israel.

This senseless murder of innocent lives was not the only thing to occur. Over 250 people were ripped from their family's homes and from friends and taken into Gaza as civilian hostages, as human shields. These hostages represent over two dozen nationalities and include Jews, Christians, Muslims, Buddhists, Hindus and indeed atheists. Their only crime, according to Hamas, was being a member of the Jewish state. Today, 366 days later, 101 hostages remain in Gaza, and their fate and condition are still unknown. When evil strikes, it's not time to be hesitant, manoeuvre or be ambiguous. When evil strikes, it's not a time for moral indecision. In each generation, evil has a name. In this generation, that name is Hamas.

Since the October 7 attacks, we've seen a fresh wave of antisemitism crash on our shores. It took less than two days, following the attacks, for that to rise to the surface here in Australia. The disturbing surge of hatred on the steps of the Sydney Opera House on 9 October was astounding. Australia watched on as pro-Palestine protesters gathered, in full view of a large police presence, and openly chanted, 'Gas the Jews,' yet not a single person was arrested for hate speech or incitement to violence. Across university campuses, this antisemitism escalated, with regular pro-Palestinian marches. Protesters waved Hamas flags and organised demonstrations filled with anti-Zionist and antisemitic banners, placards and rhetoric.

Eighty years on from the world's worst demonstration of organised antisemitism, we are today seeing an uncanny resemblance in our own city streets. We've learnt that Jewish students and lecturers are being harassed at their university campuses and in their workplaces. University authorities are failing to take decisive action to address the rising wave of hatred.

At Senate estimates earlier this year, we heard of what was going on at our university campuses. I personally met with some of the students that came to see me here in this place, and they told me the tale of what is going on at their university campus, just a few kilometres away from this building here, at ANU. The remarkable thing about their story was that they were putting up with these taunts and these racial vilifying comments by the people that were encamped there at ANU. They were putting up with it not just at their university campus but at their home, because these were residential students having to deal with this at their own place of accommodation. They couldn't escape it. They weren't just exposed to it when they had their contact hours. They were living with it every single day and dealing with the fear of being targeted in the way that they were.

In Senate estimates, we had the ANU vice-chancellor in front of us, and there were, no doubt, very sincere platitudes given in regard to the fact that care, love and nurturing is provided to all students. But, while those students who were in the public gallery sat there—and I was watching them as answers were given by people at the table—they were hanging their heads and shaking their heads because they know that there is not enough that's being done to stamp out the racism, to stamp out this atrocious activity that's occurring there on their campus.

More needs to be done. Jewish Australians no longer feel safe in their homes, their places of worship or in an education setting. The antisemitism to which we had once said 'never again' has raised its ugly head from our own soil. One year on, the hostile antisemitic fog continues to hover over this nation. As thousands have poured into the streets in solidarity with terrorist groups, the leader of this nation has been painfully slow to act. The pleas from Jewish Australians have been met with little more than a special envoy appointment by the Prime Minister. The Labor Party is a shadow from former prime minister Bob Hawke's warning. If the bell tolls for Israel, he said, it won't just toll for Israel; it will toll for all mankind. Led by a prime minister that continues to toe the line and a foreign minister that chooses to pander to pro-Palestinian activists, the proverbial bell has tolled on the deaf ears of the Australian Labor Party.

The recent inquiry into the rise of antisemitism shows that Jewish Australians are suffering the consequences of this government's approach. One submission for the Commission of Inquiry into Antisemitism at Australian Universities Bill 2024 (No. 2) said:

I am a Jewish Australian, born and raised in Western Australia (WA)—

my home state—

and have lived here with my family for 65 years. I am deeply concerned about the rise of anti-Semitism in Australia and globally. My greatest concern is the lack of strong leadership from those in positions of power and authority in Australia. These leaders often appear reluctant to take decisive action against anti-Semitism, possibly to avoid offending the larger Muslim community and risking their political support.

The author of this submission is not alone in this concern. I think they've nailed it—absolutely nailed it. It's exactly why, and it's exactly what's going on. In this Prime Minister, we do not have a leader who will stand firm in the face of adversity; we have a crowd-pleaser who is at the beck and call of applause.

Someone who deeply understood the cost of standing up for freedom was the German theologian and pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Known for his resistance to the Nazi regime during World War II, Bonhoeffer was imprisoned and eventually executed for his defiance. In his most influential work, The Cost of Discipleship, he introduced the concept of cheap grace, a grace that demands nothing from the believer and requires no sacrifice. In the same way, we must ensure that our commitment to freedom is not reduced to cheap freedom. True freedom, as Bonhoeffer's idea of costly grace suggests, comes at a price, demanding vigilance, accountability and sometimes profound sacrifice. This is the very lesson we are reminded of today.

As we reflect on the brutal violence inflicted upon Israel, we cannot afford to take our own freedoms for granted nor can we expect to endure without our active defence. The freedoms we enjoy here in Australia, like freedoms of speech, assembly and religion, are invaluable but require a commitment to stand against those who would harm them, whether at home or, indeed, abroad. As Australians, we know that we have been fortunate, blessed even, to live in a country where peace and democracy prevail. Like Israel, we too must be ready to defend these blessings, knowing that they are not guaranteed and that real freedom always comes at a cost.

In closing, when laying the cornerstone of the future site of the Holocaust Memorial Museum in October 1988, President Ronald Reagan said:

We must make sure that from now until the end of days all humankind stares this evil in the face, that all humankind knows what this evil looks like and how it came to be. And when we truly know it for what it was, then and only then can we be sure that it will never come again.

Well, evil visited the nation of Israel on October 7 and we are now all too familiar with what evil looks like. As conflict rages on and as Israel fights to defend itself against the terrorist groups in the region, we know what evil looks like. The State of Israel suffered a grievous blow on that day. We refuse to forget the crime on humanity that was October 7, irrespective of left-wing ideology or rhetoric. On this one-year anniversary, I lend my prayers to the men, the women and the children of Israel and to the Australian families whose grief cannot be consoled. As they have done for centuries, the Jewish people will demonstrate their resilience, and I have no doubt that they will continue to prevail.

Paul Scarr (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Multicultural Engagement) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Before making my contribution, if I can pay my deep compliments to my colleague Senator O'Sullivan for that outstanding contribution on this motion. Last night, on 7 October 2024, I attended a commemoration convened by the Jewish community of Queensland on the first anniversary of the horrific events of 7 October 2023. My thoughts and prayers are with the Jewish community in Queensland. I'd like to acknowledge the contributions made during that commemoration by young members of the Jewish community. It was extremely difficult to make contributions in the context of such grief while dealing with such confronting issues, but I say to those young members of the Jewish community who had contributions last night: you should be extremely proud of yourselves, because you, as young members of the community, showed so much courage. In making your contributions, you bring great honour upon the Jewish community of Queensland and you give hope for the future.

At the commemoration a poem was read by a member of the community. It was a poem written by Shimon Elkabets, who lost his daughter on 7 October 2023. I want to read this poem into the record. It was called 'Never Again':

Most terrifying is the longing

That lands on you without warning

It makes you cry at the most ill-timed moment

Right when you have a bag of items at the checkout

What stings the most is the feeling of guilt

Why weren't you with her in the moments of terror

In the hours she was under fire and blood

All she wanted is for you

To say that everything will be OK.

Never again our parents told us

Never again our leaders promised

Never again we told our children

Only the world is no longer there for us

Most terrifying is the longing

Why weren't you with her

All she wanted is for you

To say that everything will be okay

Never again our parents told us

Never again our leaders promised

Never again we told our children

Only the world is no longer there for us

We're left on our own

Most terrifying is the longing

Is the longing

That's a poem that was read at the commemoration in Brisbane last night—a poem by Shimon Elkabets, who lost his daughter on 7 October.

After hearing that poem last night, I decided to see what I could find about the Elkabets family and the experience of a father that led him to write such a heart-wrenching poem. There is an article in the Jerusalem Post from 13 August 2024 which provides the context in which Mr Elkabets wrote that poem. I want to quote from this article. The article relates to the experience of the Elkabets family.

… one family in four houses scattered across Kfar Aza, a kibbutz near the Gaza border where terrorists murdered more than 50 and took about 20 hostages on October 7.

It describes:

… the Elkabets family, who had been celebrating the 36th wedding anniversary of the parents, Shimon and Anati Elkabets, the night before. They lived in one house, while their daughter Noa lived in the young people's neighborhood of the kibbutz, and their daughter Sivan and her boyfriend, Naor Hasidim, were in a third house, and their son, Guy, and his wife and children, in another.

So four houses in the kibbutz the family was spread across. I quote from the article:

On the morning of the massacre, they might as well have been separated by thousands of miles, although the actual distance among their homes was just a few hundred meters. Following the firing of missiles from Gaza, they soon heard gunshots and communicated with each other by phone. Each house faced a different ordeal, as terrorists entered each one, killing some and giving up on others when they could not easily open doors to the safe rooms.

Another son Nadav … was in touch with them from afar and asked his army commanders to send him there right away, but was told he would be given orders soon. Meanwhile, reports of the massacre began to surface, through text messages and news reports. Guided by the texts from his family, he began directing the army to different houses under attack.

THE FAMILY MEMBERS' concern for each other is touching as they all worry about the others. When they stopped hearing from Sivan at about 11 that morning, she became the focus of their concern. Shimon speaks movingly, more with his eyes than with his words, about wanting to help his daughter, who was so close, yet so far. Anati hoped against hope that her daughter had survived.

They all wondered where the army was, and it took days for the kibbutz to be cleared of terrorists, although some of the survivors were evacuated after about 12 hours.

Shimon, a prominent print and radio journalist, was eventually able to find out some of the details about his daughter's last moments, as the family learned that she was found dead in a different house.

A documentary film about their experiences shows:

… a visit by the survivors to Sivan's home months later, where they discovered a bloodstained apartment that had been trashed, which featured a sign that even in their worst nightmares they never imagined they would see, "Human Remains on the Sofa." The first responders used such signs to mark the homes where bodies had been found.

That is the story of the Elkabets family, the father of whom, Shimon, wrote the poem Never Again, which was read in Brisbane last night at the commemoration of the events of 7 October.

Within a few kilometres of the events occurring at the kibbutz was an amazing act of bravery. I would like to place on the record this act of bravery which I think should give us all hope. I'll quote again from an article, this time by reporter Deborah Danan, entitled, 'Bedouin bus driver credited with saving 30 Israelis from Hamas's outdoor party massacre'. This article was written on 21 October 2023, so a few weeks after the event. It says:

Youssef Ziadna recalls driving into the line of fire …

Every day at 4 p.m., Youssef Ziadna receives a phone call from a psychologist. Every evening, he sits on his balcony drinking coffee, smoking and replaying in his mind the worst things he has ever seen.

The daily routine would have been unimaginable for Ziadna, a 47-year-old Bedouin Israeli resident of Rahat, just two weeks ago. A minibus driver, he filled his days ferrying passengers around Israel's southern region.

But on October 7, he was called to pick up one of his regular customers and raced headlong into Hamas's brutal terror assault on Israel. He is credited with having rescued 30 people, all Jewish Israelis, from the massacre at the outdoor Supernova party near Israel's southern border, dodging bullets and veering off-road to bring them to safety.

"I would never wish on anyone to see what I saw," Ziadna told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. "This is trauma for my whole life. When I sit alone and recollect, I can't help the tears."

…   …   …

Ziadna is "a larger-than-life man to whom we will forever be indebted," Amit Hadar wrote in Hebrew in a post that was shared widely starting on October 7. "When, with God's help, we reach better days, save the number for the next time you need a ride—if anyone deserves it, this person does."

Yet at the same time, Ziadna is grieving a cousin who was murdered during the attack and worrying about four other family members who remain missing. He also received a threat from someone who claimed to be affiliated with Hamas, vowing retaliation for Ziadna's efforts to save Jews after they were recounted in a local newspaper.

…   …   …

The stress of it all has already sent him to the emergency room with chest pains—but he is determined to press on.

I quote again from this amazing human being:

"When I think about it, I ask how did we get out of there," Ziadna recalled on October 17, 10 days after the massacre. "I guess it's fate that we're meant to live longer in this world."

Ziadna started October 7 early, driving Hadar and eight of his friends from the town of Omer to the rave at Kibbutz Re'im at 1 a.m. He left with the instruction to pick them up the following day at 3 p.m.

But at 6 a.m. he received a call for help from Hadar. Believing that the call for help was due to a code red for incoming rockets fired from Gaza, Ziadna raced to his bus.

"I didn't wash my face, I didn't even get dressed," Ziadna said. "This is standard over here in the south."

But as soon as he reached the Sa'ad junction, a mile away from Kfar Aza, one of the Gaza border communities that experienced some of the worst horrors of the Oct. 7 massacre, a new picture began to emerge.

A man who had escaped from the party ran towards him, furiously signaling to Ziadna to make a U-turn. Ziadna, not comprehending, exited the minibus to speak to him. Moments later, Ziadna, the man and a woman who accompanied him were caught in gunfire.

"Bullets were flying everywhere," Ziadna said, adding that the three dived into a ditch on the side of the road. He said, "I raised my head and the guy told me, 'Why are you doing that? You'll get a bullet in your brain!'"

Ziadna told the disbelieving couple that he would continue on to the site of the party. "I stared death in the face," he said. "But I knew I couldn't give up on my missions. I will go and rescue them."

Navigating through bullet fire, Ziadna managed to reach his passengers at the scene of the party … where an inferno of bodies, blood and bullets rained. "I told them to bring as many as possible," he said. Twenty-four additional people crammed into the 14-seater vehicle, and on the way, they rescued another couple, one of whom had been shot in the leg. Ziadna says he also caught sight of a motorized Hamas paraglider hovering above, spraying bullets with a machine gun at revelers.

Under constant gunfire, the minibus sped away.

This is what Ziadna said at the end of recalling his story:

"I had an option to go back. A weaker man may have done a U-turn at that junction," … "But I said no way, I will throw myself at death if it means I can save lives."

Ziadna, I'm telling your story here in the Australian Senate because you provide inspiration to the whole world.

At the end of the Queensland commemoration of 7 October 2023, we lit lanterns. We lit lanterns—lanterns giving off light, lanterns dispelling darkness. Light is a symbol of good. Light is a symbol of beauty. Light is a symbol of redemption, healing, truth, peace, justice and hope. Let us pray for more light in this world. Let us pray for more light, dispelling darkness.

Jonathon Duniam (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Environment, Fisheries and Forestry) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I too would like to make a contribution to this opportunity to reflect on, frankly, unimaginable loss—loss that is incomprehensible on so many levels—and, similarly, on the inhumane acts by some in our world that have led to this loss. The scale and the depravity, the tragedy, that so many have experienced in this conflict is extremely well documented, both in the media but also by many of my colleagues here. We've just heard a couple of very moving contributions about exactly how what we're talking about here, one year on from 7 October 2023, has impacted some in our community, mainly the Jewish community of Australia, but particularly the Jewish community right around the world.

As we reflect one year on, I think it is critically important for us to consider that normally reflections on these sorts of things occur after a static event. But we reflect on this as these events continue to unfold, as the harm and pain continue to be felt by members of the Jewish community in Israel, those who are caught up in this heartless, hate-filled attack on a people, simply because of who they were. Normally we stop, take stock and hope it never happens again, but in this instance it continues to happen—and, sadly, not just in Israel but around the world, as I'll come to a little later on.

Australia is a country where people can go about their business safely. They can conduct themselves in a way where they don't have to fear for their life or their safety, where they don't have to worry about a threat to their existence and where they don't have to worry about threats to them or to their family. Frankly, it's something that we take for granted in this country. It's nothing like this for those who live in Israel, for example. What we've seen happen was based on, or at least caused by, who the victims in this conflict are—by their faith and identity, something that they're born with and cannot change. They are targets because of those characteristics and attributes.

Reflection is important because, for us as an advanced society, reflecting on what has happened, good and bad, is something that enables us to understand what's at stake—what is at stake, in this case, for Israel, for the Jewish community in Israel and globally, and for our global community, which is watching very closely what happens there and how world leaders respond to this. To relent in the face of heinous acts of terror—and these are acts of terror we're talking about; the acts of October 7 were not acts of war but acts of terror undertaken by a terrorist organisation—as some are demanding that Israel should do in the name of ceasefire, I think, frankly, is something that cannot stand up to scrutiny. It is not the right course of action to relent in the face of actions driven by pure hatred and nothing good of the human spirit.

Israel is a shining beacon surrounded by other nations that are the antithesis of what it is. They're a nation that respects the law, and they respect one another. Pluralism is part of their societal make-up. They're a democracy. They have equality. I've travelled there. I've seen what this country is like. I know the people who live there. To suggest, as some have in this debate, that they are anything other than what I've described them as, I think, is, frankly, atrocious. Those qualities I've just outlined are things we value and respect here in this country. Where are those who ordinarily would be preaching and crying out for these things to be upheld elsewhere in the world? They're nowhere to be seen in this debate. Instead, sadly, some in fact are whipping up that hatred and division or at least standing by and allowing it to happen, grow and continue. Who's going to counter this? Where is the strength of leadership required from our leaders? Where is it when we need it most?

It is this lack of leadership that in part has led to the surge in antisemitism in our community and, indeed, globally. It is a global phenomenon, but it should not be a part of what we in this country accept as okay. It should not be allowed to happen. The equivalence that's been drawn between what happened to Israel and the response—the right for entities to simply continue on in the way that some in this government have suggested—is an attempt to walk both sides of this debate and, frankly, has given permission for some to act in the way that they have in this debate.

In Tasmania, we have only a very small Jewish community, but they feel it as much as anywhere else in the country. Our capital city, Hobart, has protests every weekend for people who support freedom for Palestine, but, as a by-product of that chant and the protests that they run every week, there is an impact on the Jewish community, small though that community is, and they feel it. Only recently, there was some reporting, sadly, related to some of what I believe is antisemitic sentiment in our community, originating from the University of Tasmania. One of their senior lecturers questioned Israel's right to exist and described Hamas as a legitimate resistance movement. These are academics in a university in our country saying these things. What can a Jewish Australian, someone who might even have moved here from Israel, think when they hear someone who is purportedly educated saying these things? To suggest that it is a misconception that Israel has a right to exist and that it is a misconception that Hamas is a terrorist organisation—in fact, to suggest that it is actually a legitimate resistance movement—is unbelievable and terribly hurtful.

Of course, all of this information around this senior lecturer at the University of Tasmania was removed from social media as soon as media outlets were alerted and started asking questions. One has to wonder, if they were so proud to run seminars at the university in their facilities, preaching this sort of information, then why was the information removed from social media? This same academic described Israel as a 'racist apartheid state'. They were reported to have said at the event at which these slides were displayed that, as I said before, Israel has 'no right to exist', Jews in Israel should 'go back where they came from', 'Hamas is a legitimate resistance movement' and there is no peaceful way to resolve the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

This is exactly what we're talking about. This is the sentiment that is swirling around in our society. When leaders do not stand up and decry it and say, 'This is wrong, and it should not be said,' this is allowed to go unchecked. Then individuals who lend credibility to the things they're saying by virtue of their academic background give credence to these terrible, racist and uninformed views. It is interesting, though, when we consider the context of these comments made by a supposedly senior academic. Why were these comments not being made on 6 October but only in the wake of the tragedy on October 7? Why is it that this is the kind of thing that needs to be said after Israelis have been slaughtered, murdered, raped, beheaded? Why was this not a slide presentation being given a month or a year before? It's because it was being done in this context. The fact that anyone in our developed, respectful, tolerant society, especially somebody who is an academic from a higher education institution, can possibly say this tells me there are some things very wrong with our society, and this is why leadership is needed. If we don't stamp out this sort of sentiment—and this is not just freedom of speech; this is an attack on people because of a particular characteristic, and it cannot be clothed in any other way. And this is why leadership is required here.

I stand with those affected by this—our small Jewish community in Tasmania, who felt the pain like many others around the world. May it never happen again.

David Shoebridge (NSW, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to 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?

Karen Grogan (SA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The question before the chamber is that the amendments moved by Senator Bermingham be agreed to. Is a division required? It being past 6.30 pm, the division will be deferred until tomorrow.

Anne Urquhart (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

URQUHART (—) (): I advise that the government is considering whether it can support some of the opposition's amendments and will ask for the question to be divided accordingly when the deferred division on the amendment is dealt with tomorrow.

Paul Scarr (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Multicultural Engagement) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I note the point made by the Government Whip. That is something which will need to be reflected upon when we hear the government's position with respect to the proposed amendments, which ones are agreed to and which ones potentially aren't agreed to.

Karen Grogan (SA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I feel this matter will be dealt with tomorrow. Is everyone in agreement? Good.

Senate adjourned at 20:53