Albanese and Wong are on the wrong side of history

Australia didn’t let distance stop it from acting against apartheid in South Africa. It shouldn’t let it be an excuse now. Palestine can’t wait, and it really is time for Australia to act right now.

The first day of a new parliamentary term always contains the ceremonial pantomime of speeches, pageantry, and the carefully staged managed political of business as usual. But outside the walls of Parliament, there is a façade that is starting to break – ever so slowly – but it is starting to break. Thousands of protestors converged on Canberra not to celebrate the opening of the Parliamentary term but to demand that Australia end its silence and complicity – in the face of what many consider to be a genocide inflicted by the state of Israel upon the people of Gaza, and to take substantial action against the Israel government’s systematic and obvious destruction of Palestine.

The Australian government’s position on the conflict in Gaza has been untenable for some time, with Israel continuing to blockade Gaza’s borders, preventing adequate food and medical aid from reaching the population, and enforcing mass starvation. International agencies have been forced out of Gaza and replaced with the much-criticised Israeli-controlled entity – the so-called Gaza Humanitarian Foundation – the Orwellian name that has become a symbol of the obscene and brutal failure to meet even the most basic humanitarian standards: over a thousand Palestinians have been killed since May, either gunned down at food distribution points or crushed in stampedes after being corralled into cages, just like cattle in a slaughterhouse. And yet, the international response still remains weak and putrid, unable to respond to the stench of Israel’s acts of genocide. The Australian government, while it did join a list of 28 countries condemning Israel’s actions, has offered little else besides sterile diplomatic language.

Foreign Minister Penny Wong still continues with this sterilisation – delivering statements stifled by caution, and carefully crafted to avoid upsetting Australia’s domestic Israel lobby or distort the broader Zionist narrative. Her performative concern is less directed at the lives being lost in Gaza and more at the political optics of dissent within the Parliament itself. If it wasn’t evident before, it was made pretty obvious when Wong moved a rare and severe censure motion against the Australian Greens Senator Mehreen Faruqi, for the grand offence of holding up a sign that said “Gaza is starving. Words won’t feed them. Sanction Israel” during the Governor–General’s address in the joint parliamentary sitting.

Rather than engage with the message and the uncomfortable truth it represents, Senator Wong punished the messenger, describing Faruqi’s actions as a breach of “decorum,” accusing her of disrespecting Parliament and denigrating those who disagree with her. The Senate’s censure went far beyond a symbolic reprimand; it includes an extraordinary punishment that strips Faruqi of any right to represent the Senate on delegations for the remainder of the term – effectively sidelining her for next three years.

A Senator censured and silenced, not for inciting violence or spreading disinformation, but for calling for sanctions against a foreign government accused of war crimes. It was a clear indication of how far Australia’s political establishment is willing to go to preserve its diplomatic and ideological alliances – supporting a genocide even at the cost of democratic dissent. Again, this was a performative and over-the-top action that ultimately wasn’t even directed towards Faruqi, or even the Australian electorate: it was directed towards the Israel lobby in Australia, to make it clear which side of the genocide Senator Wong is siding with.

Senator Faruqi, in her response, drew on Martin Luther King’s ‘Letter from a Birmingham Jail’, and criticised the “white moderates”, more concerned about procedures and protocols, rather than justice, setting their standards to cover over the truth and not wanting to do anything about the genocide in Gaza. And as the bombs continue to fall on Gaza, as children continue to starve, as neighbourhoods are reduced to rubble, the Australian government will find that the most enduring legacy won’t be anything else it does this term, but its silence and failure to act on a genocide that everyone else in the world can see in plain sight.

Silence is compliance

The speed at which this censure motion against Senator Faruqi was introduced, debated, and passed was also a sign of how desperate the Labor government is to appease the Israel lobby and Zionists in Australia. Within just an hour of the Senate’s commencement, Senator Wong negotiated a censure – not against the state of Israel, whose military actions, according to independent reports, have led to the deaths of well over 80,000 Palestinians – but against a fellow Senator who was simply protesting in silence. All over a cardboard sign – and on a type of cardboard that Palestinians are currently eating, just to fill their stomachs and force away the pangs of hunger, because they have nothing else to eat – there were no threats, no incitement, just a plea to acknowledge the starvation of a people under siege.

Of all of these actions in federal Parliament, Senator Mehreen Faruqi is the only one who has been censured.

It wasn’t wearing a burqa into the Senate – as Pauline Hanson did in 2017 to make a racist point – or turning the back on a Welcome to Country event – Hanson, again to make a racist point, this time in front of the Governor–General – or wearing a fluro vest, brandishing a large salmon, or wearing a wig – all of these events have taken place in Parliament, yet only Faruqi’s actions have received a censure.

Faruqi’s act was moral statement, and the nature of her punishment – above and beyond anyone else – reveals the deep capture of Australia’s political establishment by the Israel lobby and aligned Zionist organisations, and provides the clearest example of how lopsided the political landscape has become and how pathetically weak our governments are.

Faruqi didn’t call for violence or deny Israel’s right to exist; she just demanded that Israel be held accountable for its actions and crimes against humanity – had the same sign expressed solidarity with Israel, there’s little doubt that it would have gone unnoticed, and even applauded by Wong. And this is the grand act of hypocrisy: the rules of so-called “decorum” are only enforced when they challenge the dominant narrative from vested and racist interests, and the dominant narrative within this Labor government remains solidly pro-Israel, no matter how severe the atrocities become. Senator Faruqi was punished not for disrupting Parliament – she didn’t do any disruption anyway – but for daring to tell the truth and speaking out against Israel.

But things are shifting – slowly but surely and, as usual, the political class is lagging far behind public sentiment. The barbarity of Israel’s actions is now too obvious, too public and too cruel to ignore. What once existed in the shadows – carpet bombing and “lawn mowing” of refugee camps, deliberate starvation of children, shooting at aid queues – now floods social media feeds, news broadcasts, and diplomatic circles. Protests are growing and the Australian public is beginning to understand what’s being done in its name, and many are rejecting it. Eventually, the political class will get it, despite its psychopathic desires to ignore it.

The language used by Prime Minister Anthony Albanese over the weekend has become marginally more critical of Israel, where at least he acknowledged that the actions in Gaza breach international law, before self-censoring himself and adding that he’s not a lawyer and couldn’t be too sure about that. But these sterner words have been said before, yet never matched up with action. The Albanese government refuses to take the next obvious steps – recalling the Israeli ambassador, cutting military co-operation, halting arms exports, suspending trade, or issuing meaningful diplomatic condemnation.

If the Australian government does not change course soon – if it continues to mumble platitudes while Gaza is turned to rubble and its population is massacred – it won’t be remembered very kindly at all on this issue, irrespective of how large its parliamentary majority is at the moment. History won’t be looking back and admiring Albanese’s caution; it will remember the silence and the moral cowardice. It will remember a government that had a choice but chose not to offend a lobby group and stood idly by as tens of thousands of people were slaughtered.

This should be a turning point – not just for Palestine, but for Australia. A nation that claims to champion democracy, human rights, and a rules-based international order can’t stand by while those very principles are obliterated in the same way that the Palestinian tent cities have been. To avoid acting isn’t neutrality, it’s cowardly complicity. And complicity, no matter how softly spoken or politely phrased, will always be on the wrong side of history.

What Australia can do to end the genocide

Many Australians claim that the geographic distance from the Middle East limits our ability to intervene, and that includes Senator Wong, who claimed it was “always very difficult from over here to make judgements”. But it’s a weak and pathetic argument that makes no sense at all. We made a judgement to sanction Russia, which is even further away – there are many other sanctions in place on countries such as Syria, Libya, Yemen, South Sudan, North Korea, Lebanon, Iran – and a quick look at a map will show that all of these countries are far away and not within Australia’s usual sphere of influence.

In contrast, Australia actively opposed the apartheid regime in South Africa in the 1980s – another country half a world away with white supremacy beliefs and policies at the time that are not too dissimilar to Israel – and used a great deal of pressure to bring about change, a change that finally arrived in 1990 with the release of Nelson Mandela. And, at the time, there was bipartisan support within Australia to act against South Africa, despite the efforts of the US and British governments to cease and desist.

Many of the same actions could be taken today against Israel to help bring an end to its occupation of Palestinian territories and the genocide it has inflicted on Gaza. Australia could formally recognise the state of Palestine – as France has promised to do in September – and a move already made by over 140 United Nations member states. It could expel Israeli diplomats, suspend military co-operation, and more forcefully condemn Israel’s violations of international law. The government could support Palestinian efforts to join global institutions such as the International Criminal Court and the International Court of Justice, and it could endorse South Africa’s genocide case against Israel.

Trade restriction is another option. Australia could ban imports produced in illegal Israeli settlements in the West Bank and impose targeted Magnitsky-style sanctions on Israeli military leaders involved in the bombing campaigns and siege of Gaza. It could stop exporting weapons components to Israel’s defence industry and cut defence co-operation agreements. Public funds could be divested from companies that support or profit from the occupation and war.

Cultural and academic boycotts would also have impact. During the apartheid era, Australia refused to host South African athletes and artists, and encouraged international bodies to boycott South Africa from global events. What Australia did then, can be applied to Israel today, alongside an increase in humanitarian aid and support for Palestine.

But the reality is that Australia has done almost none of this. Despite the growing body of evidence of human rights abuses and collective punishment in Gaza – and the evidence can be seen almost every single moment on social media and international news broadcasts – the Albanese government has behaved in a morally bankrupt way and supported the oppressors.

Within federal Parliament, there seems to be very little appetite for change. While the Greens have consistently called for sanctions and recognition of Palestine, and some Labor MPs have expressed concern – this week, Victoria Labor Party members have pushed for the immediate recognition of Palestine, as has the federal Labor member Ed Husic – the leadership has opted for cautious, ambiguous language. Statements from Senator Wong and Prime Minister Albanese have largely reflected those from the United States, reflexively condemning Hamas because they haven’t got anything else to say, and going out of their way to avoid any direct critique of Israel’s military campaign or its decades-long occupation of Palestinian territories. And while they actively condemn Hamas, they fail to explain the ongoing terrorism and settler violence in the West Bank, where Hamas doesn’t even exist.

Today’s pro-Palestine campaign in Australia is still gaining traction – it’s frustratingly slow, but it’s moving at a pace that might soon be impossible to stop, and that’s what the government fears the most. The trade unions, churches, and student groups that were instrumental in the 1980s in building the political momentum needed for action against South Africa are going through a similar mobilisation now and will ultimately force the government to abandon its passive stance.

Public opinion is shifting in Australia, with the continuing mass protests in many cities, more pressure from human rights organisations, and a greater awareness of these issues within the electorate, especially among younger people. But without bold political leadership, Australia risks remaining on the sidelines of history – condemning atrocities in words, but not in deeds.

Australia didn’t let distance stop it from acting against apartheid in South Africa. It shouldn’t let it be an excuse now. Palestine can’t wait, and it really is time for Australia to act right now.