MICHAEL KROGER - ANOTHER ZIONIST WHO LIVES IN AUSTRALIA

Michael Kroger, the latest zionist to come out of the closet, is now taking the Greens candidate for the Batman by-election to task because of her support for BDS.

The candidate, Alex Bhathal, has now stated that she doesn't support all of the BDS items, particularly two of them.

There are probably more zionists in 2018 in Australia than there are in Israel, but unlike those in Israel where most are probably Jewish, the vast majority of those in Australia are Christian.

The question is, why??

The answer must assuredly be that they are trying to get the Jewish zionists to move to Israel, thus saving them the problem of their ongoing anti-semitism.

After all, there are only somewhere between 100,000 and 120,000 Jews in Australia, and once Isael has kicked out most of the African refugees there and also the Palestinian Israeli citizens who still live in the so-called officially recognised  "borders" of Israel, there will be more than enough extra places for Australian Jewish zionists.

After all, apart from the Christian zionists like Michael Kroger, there are the fanatical Jewish zionists like the federal member for Israel Michael Danby - who still calls Australia home.

Does Michael Kroger know that there are many Jews in Australia who do not toe the zionist/Israel line and who support BDS?

Many of them also don't fear the political consequences of complete boycotts of Israel as some of the Greens seem to do. The Greens still have a great deal of growing up to do, and they should have trips to South Africa and learn what BDS achieved there in the apartheid years.

Of course Israel apartheid is easier to enforce because of the numbers involved, but with the ongoing genocide of the Palestinians, the Israelis hope to one day have the numbers.

UNITED STATES GREEN PARTY FOREIGN POLICY ON PALESTINE-ISRAEL AND BDS

Our Australian Greens should take a leaf out of the United States' Green Party's book. Here is the latter's statement on US foreign policy, Palestine-Israel & BDS. (Their leader and presidential candidate is Dr Jill Stein):

"The Jill Stein campaign calls for ending support for governments committing war crimes and massive human rights violations, including Israel and Saudi Arabia. It supports the BDS movement as a peaceful, nonviolent set of actions organized by civil society across the world aimed to end Israel apartheid, occupation, war crimes, and systematic human rights abuses.

"US foreign policy requires an emergency overhaul, from a program of total global military and economic domination, to a policy of promoting international law, human rights and diplomacy. We must cease and desist from being, in the words of Martin Luther King, the greatest purveyor of violence the world over. Our foreign policy currently serves war profiteers and fossil fuel companies, but not the American people or the cause of global justice, peace and security. Our failed wars of the past 14 years have cost us 5 trillion dollars, left over a million people dead in Iraq alone, and killed or maimed tens of thousands of US service men and women. Yet we - and the Middle East - are far less secure, not more secure.

"In addition to ending our catastrophic and immoral wars for oil and markets, we must stop aiding and abetting the human rights violations and war crimes of our allies who are massively defying international law. This includes the Israeli government and the rulers of Saudi Arabia. With regard to Israel, the United States has encouraged the worst tendencies of the Israeli government as it pursues policies of occupation, apartheid, assassination, illegal settlements, demolitions, blockades, building of nuclear bombs, indefinite detention, collective punishment, and defiance of international law. Instead of allying with the courageous proponents of peace and human rights within Palestine and Israel, our government has rewarded consistent abusers of human rights.

"Therefore, the Stein campaign calls for ending military and economic support for the Israeli government while it is committing war crimes and defying international law. In addition, the Stein campaign supports actions of nonviolent resistance to the policies of the occupation and of the Israeli apartheid regime, including those of the global boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) campaign, which was endorsed by the Green Party of the United States in 2005 and is supported by thousands of civil society peace activists and organizations.

"Consistency in US policy regarding human rights and international law will begin, but not end, with Palestine and Israel. I will apply this same approach to other nations such as Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Egypt, among others.

"Finally, we call for the establishment of a Palestine and Israel Truth & Reconciliation Commission as the vehicle for shifting from an era of US support of human rights and international law violations to one based on justice and truth bringing all parties together as equals to seek workable solutions. A dedicated commitment to justice will further the security of all parties, Palestinians, Israelis, and all people in the region, much better than the current policies of politically, economically and militarily supporting the systemic and institutionalized abuse of one side against the other."

Posted by MERC at 7:57 AM 5 comments:

Labels: BDS, The Greens

NEWMATILDA, THE GREENS AND THE TROLLS

For many years the conspiracy theories have suggested  that many of the trolls who post on sites like newmatilda, crikey and others of similar political persuasion are actually Israeli government/Mossad/Shin Bet plants to try to discredit those who either support BDS, support the Palestinians, are anti-zionist or they are ALL anti-semites.

The question to be asked is if these vehement and nasty and repulsive individuals continue to be so upset by what the left-wing/right-wing/anti-zionist/anti-semitic Greens/all political parties and adherents and members say in their criticism of Israel and the zionists, WHY ARE THEY STILL LIVING IN AUSTRALIA????

The last few days have seen the Greens new leader putting both feet in his mouth with his possible ignorance of what is going on in Palestine. Someone has suggested that he check for information with Lee Rhiannon, but she let the team down a long time ago when she moved from the New South Wales parliament to the federal parliament and dumped her support for Palestine and the Palestinians.

As far as I am concerned, this is just not good enough. Most parliamentarians around the country are zionists, and as one does not need to be Jewish to be a zionist, most of the zionists in Australian parliaments are of course not Jewish.

In all of these discussions, the plight of Palestine and the Palestinians is forgotten and the crimes in Gaza committed by the Israelis over the last 50 and more years is forgotten and the Palestinians are the forgotten people.

I have seen it all before - in South Africa, in the UK, in Australia, in Palestine/Israel and of course the USA and Canada and many other countries around the world too numerous to mention.

HAVE THE GREENS LOST THE PLOT OR DON'T THEY WANT VOTES ANY MORE?

It is difficult to know where to start at a time when a state election is almost upon us and the two major parties - or if you look at it from a left/right perspective, and we then have one party with a right wing and an ultra-right wing - and you know you can't vote for what they represent and you wonder who you will be able to vote for, and you thought maybe the Greens provided an alternative which would be viable and then the following:

Philip Nitschke slams 'shut-out by Senate' in euthanasia inquiry

Date

October 15, 2014 smh

·                      

Vanessa Desloires

·                             

Controversial euthanasia campaigner Philip Nitschke has accused the  Senate of shutting him out of an inquiry into a proposed Dying With Dignity law.

Dr Nitschke said that neither he nor his recently formed Voluntary Euthanasia Party were asked to speak at a hearing for the inquiry in Melbourne on Wednesday, despite representing the "largest and only national pro-euthanasia organisation in Australia".

The founder of Exit International blamed Greens senator Richard Di Natale, who has proposed the Dying with Dignity Bill, for the exclusion, and was angry that groups who had made "uncharitable and incorrect statements" about him in their submissions were invited to speak.  

It comes after the Medical Board of Australia suspended his licence to practice medicine due to concerns he supported the suicide of a man who was not terminally ill.

He was also recently criticised by The Australian Medical Association, Dying with Dignity Victoria and beyondblue.

So the Greens are a failure on the Euthanasia issue - and what else have they collapsed on? Think of Palestine/Israel and think of Lee Rhiannon and her pro-Palestinian support while she was a New South Wales state parliamentarian. Then she became a senator for the Greens in the Commonwealth parliament and joined the right-wing of the Greens in no longer supporting the Palestinians.

Where does it leave you as someone looking for a group or party to vote for?

Well as one of those voters it leaves me feeling it is all a waste of time and effort and as someone with a sense of humour is quoted as saying - don't vote - it only encourages them!

 

LEFT IS RIGHT? GREEN IS BLUE?

LEFT IS RIGHT? GREEN IS BLUE?

3 October 2013

Two articles examining the state of the left in Australian politics have recently been published, one shortly before the recent federal election and one immediately after.

The election was held on Saturday 7 September 2013 and Jeff Sparrow’s article, “The Day After the Night Before”, was published on Sunday 8 September in Overland online.

Tad Tietze’s article, “A Change in the Order of Things – the Fate of the Greens”, was published in the print edition of Overland, Issue 212 Spring 2013.

Tietze examines the state of the Greens and their role in the alliance which allowed the ALP Gillard government to govern with the assistance of a few other independents who became major players in the 3-year government.

He analyses the parts they played in a left agenda – left of the ALP – in providing a home for many voters disillusioned by the ALP’s massive swing to the right on issues such as the asylum seekers, and how their participation in a very unpopular government may have helped many people alter their support and seek alternative homes for their political beliefs.

It seems as if this problem affected the Greens’ support with the loss of support in some states, but strangely saw an increase in support in Victoria which seems to have bucked the national trend.

The Greens have one basic problem – they are trying to be too much like the 2 or 3 mainstream parties – for instance when Lee Rhiannon supported the Palestinians because she rightly sees Israel as being an apartheid state oppressing the people whose land they have stolen – and having been in the NSW state parliament when all hell broke out because of Marrickville Council’s support of the BDS movement which Rhiannon supported – when she entered federal parliament as a senator she was made to “toe the party line” and not show partisan support for Palestine as against Israel. WTF!!!

As for Sparrow and the left and looking forward and not backward, the left pathetically is not out there making the case for the major issues of the day being loudly in the public arena – where is the left’s response to the dictatorial Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) which promises –secretively – to destroy the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, the Internet and much else besides – and these are only the dribs and drabs which have been leaked for people to just get an inkling of the goings-on behind closed doors by 12 countries – so far – with more to be added as and when required.

Australia and New Zealand are 2 of the 12 countries, but you wouldn’t know anything about this from our “left” groups. Fortunately, one of the left organisations in Australia is an offshoot of a US based radical socialist group which has a newspaper regularly sent to people in Australia, and their latest edition has a large article on the TPP.

Also in this edition of the paper is a large supportive article for Private Chelsea Manning (previously Private Bradley Manning) There should be major rallying events for Manning in Australia when supporters in the US ask for international support – and what do we get in Australia from the wimpy left? Nothing to record and no publicity to advise!

In the UK, left leaning people, frustrated by the left groups’ stagnation in their abilities to challenge the policies of government and opposition regarding urgent austerity measures, organised nationally and created the People’s Assembly to have meetings and branches around the country and to demonstrate where politicians were assembling to formulate their attacks on their citizens and grind the 99 percent even lower so that the 1 percent could continue making capital at the further expense of the unemployed workers.

The new Australian government, post 7 September 2013, will be attempting to do similarly to Australian workers what the UK government is doing, and, unless there are mass protest movements, they will of course succeed.

We should all be on the streets every week, protesting at the secrecy of the Trans-Pacific Partnerships’ unknown but leaked items which are going to affect us all in ways undreamt of by the unsuspecting citizens.

If we want to make any progress as leftists we also need to ensure that the Greens come out of their “conservative” closet and show they really are an organisation of the left, and for them to stop being scared of what the reactions of the major parties will be to their new-found activism.

One of the issues of the day, and the excuses government are using to wage their wars in the middle east, packs of lies as they all are, is the Israel/Palestine story which hasn’t gone away, despite the US and Israel doing their best to prove that the Palestinians are not capable of finding anyone to do their negotiating. It really is time for the left to concentrate on outing the lies and to get on with political education of people out there who need this information to be able to make informed decisions and understand what they are arguing about.

Where are the organisers of yesteryear to organise and teach new cohorts, why are there no fighters shouting from the rooftops? Have we lost the will to protest?

Sparrow says we must not be pessimistic, but look forward, but we need the current generations to be there to educate the next generations before all is lost – irrevocably!

ASYLUM SEEKERS - CRIMES OF POLITICIANS, MEDIA AND OTHERS

Asylum seekers are people who, because of circumstances in the countries from which they have fled, are trying to reach countries where they might be able to live safely and without fear such as they have experienced elsewhere.

To demonise people in these circumstances, which is what the media and politicians have done, is to show total disregard for human rights, and much of this in countries such as Australia, which are signatories to many of the United Nations Charters on Human Rights and the rights of people to seek and obtain - asylum in other countries.

It must never be forgotten that so many of those fleeing are from countries which have been attacked and invaded by Australia and the countries with which it is in unholy alliances.

Because the media in Australia are willing participants in demonising these people, citizens of Australia see these people - as portrayed - as queue jumpers, economic migrants and people who want to enter Australia illegally.

All of these assertions are lies and mostly are done for political gain by most politicians who are each trying to outdo the other in their viciousness against desperate and helpless people who are then incarcerated in concentration camps and treated as criminals of the worst sort when they haven't committed any crimes.

The concentration camps in places such as Nauru and Papua New Guinea - the Manus Island "detention" centre - are run by organisations employed under contract to the federal government and are renowned for the viciousness of their controls in these "camps".

On top of these human rights abuses - there is no end to man's inhumanity to men, women and children - many of the people assessed for security by ASIO and other arms of government, and "found" to be unsuitable for refugee status "because they pose security risks" are then returned to the countries from which they fled, facing arrest, torture, imprisonment and often murder.

Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, Sri Lanka, Pakistan - just to name a few of those places where desperate people flee from - are countries in turmoil, having been invaded by foreign countries or have police state/dictatorship regimes and human rights abuse records where leaders of these regimes should be tried in the International Criminal Court.

Much has been recorded and written about human rights abuses in some of the countries mentioned, but for reasons which are not as yet clear, Sri Lanka seems to have escaped the media's attention until fairly recently, and when it does get mentioned, the Australian government staunchly defends it to the hilt, despite the appalling actions of its dictatorial and police state government. Memories of South Africa and the apartheid state? ....and currently Israel as another apartheid state - but we don't mention Israel!!! - it is always above reproach and one is an anti-semite if you mention the horrific human rights abuses against the Palestinians who, like the Tamils in Sri Lanka don't exist!

So to some articles which have at last started appearing in the main stream media, and here are two examples, one from Geoffrey Robertson, well known to many, dated March 2013, and the other from 28 April 2013:

ARTICLE NO. 1:

Justice crushed in Sri Lanka

March 6, 2013
By Geoffrey Robertson

Commonwealth countries risk a human rights nightmare if they capitulate to the Rajapaksa regime.

Illustration: Andrew Dyson.

The Commonwealth is sleepwalking towards a human rights disaster, if it goes ahead with November's Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in Colombo, where it will be presided over by Sri Lanka's President Mahinda Rajapaksa. Perhaps emboldened by getting away with murder - the army slaughter of some 40,000 Tamil civilians in 2009 - his government has now moved to destroy the independence of the judiciary. It has sacked the Chief Justice for a decision that it finds inconvenient.

Chief Justice Shirani Bandaranayake, former dean of Colombo Law School and the first woman to be made a Supreme Court judge, is a highly respected jurist.

Last year she infuriated the government by declaring unconstitutional a bill introduced by the President's brother, the Minister for Economic Development, which would have centralised political power (especially at the expense of the northern, largely Tamil province) and would have given the minister wide-ranging powers to infringe civil liberties. So the government decided to remove her and 117 of its tame MPs introduced a bill to impeach her on 14 charges of alleged ''misconduct''.

The principle of judicial independence requires that no judge should be impeached for doing his or her duty, merely because the decision has upset the government. That is exactly what the Rajapaksa government has done in the case of Dr Bandaranayake.

Three of the charges accused her of misinterpreting the constitution. But it is a judge's job to interpret the constitution and she gave it a purposive construction with which most judges - in Australia and elsewhere - would have agreed. Indeed, with two colleagues who joined in her judgment she interpreted the meaning of a key word in the constitution by looking it up in the Oxford English Dictionary - a familiar source of linguistic enlightenment in courts throughout the Commonwealth. But not for these 117 MPs.

Before politicians sack a respected judge, they must at least afford her a fair trial. So to whom did the Speaker, Rajapaksa's elder brother, entrust this task? To a ''Star Chamber'' of seven cabinet ministers.

It sat in secret, refusing the Chief Justice's request to admit the public and refusing to have international observers. It declined to be bound by any rules about the prosecution bearing the burden of proof and it gave her no time to prepare any defence - she was presented with 1000 pages of evidence and told to be ready for a trial starting the following day.

The tribunal chairman told her expressly that it would allow no witnesses, whereupon she and her counsel walked out, despairing of any fair trial. The next day, in her absence and without notice to her, they called 16 witnesses whom she could not in consequence cross-examine.

The result was a foregone conclusion. She was found ''guilty'' on three charges of misconduct on evidence that could not stand up in any real court and could not in any event amount to ''misconduct'' under any sensible definition.

For example, the fact that her bank had addressed her as ''Chief Justice'' on her statements was regarded as an abuse of office justifying her removal. The Supreme Court quashed the Select Committee's findings of guilt, but the President refused to obey their orders.

The President sacked her and appointed the government legal adviser, who had no judicial experience, as Chief Justice in her place. Her impeachment was celebrated with a fireworks display from the Sri Lankan navy and with entertainment, feasting and fireworks supplied by the government.

The prospect of the Queen travelling as head of the Commonwealth to Sri Lanka to provide a propaganda windfall - a royal seal of approval - for the host President after his destruction of judicial independence would make a mockery of the core democratic values for which the Commonwealth is meant to stand.

Canada has already signalled it may refuse to attend what will be a showcase for the regime, but Bob Carr is determined that Australia will be there, a position that is sure to damage Australia's standing on human rights. Mauritius, an exemplary democracy, is willing to host CHOGM, and that's where it should take place.

Geoffrey Robertson, QC, is a former UN appeal judge and the author of Crimes Against Humanity. Read his report at

barhumanrights.org.uk

ARTICLE NO.2:

'Hypocritical' government ignoring Sri Lankan abuses: Greens

By Chris Johnson
April 28, 2013

Greens leader Christine Milne has accused the government of placing domestic politics ahead of human rights by refusing to boycott the coming Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in Sri Lanka.

And Amnesty International says the violations there should be more seriously considered when Australia is forming refugee policies.

Its campaign co-ordinator, Ming Yu, said a new Amnesty International report to be released on Tuesday, titled Sri Lanka - Assault on Dissent, provided ample evidence that violations were escalating.

''We would encourage the Australian government to properly consider all the credible evidence that exists on this issue and take it into account when making their asylum seeker polices,'' Ms Yu said.

''Amnesty International would like to see Australia and the whole international community insist that if these kinds of human rights abuses continue then the government of Sri Lanka not host CHOGM or be awarded the Commonwealth chair.''

The Greens leader said it was hypocrisy on Labor's part to be sending asylum seekers back to Sri Lanka when its government continued to sponsor human rights violations - and turning a blind eye to those abuses by attending CHOGM was appalling.

Senator Milne said the Australian government was taking a ''hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil'' approach to events in Sri Lanka.

Her rebuke follows Foreign Minister Bob Carr's insistence on being at the November summit despite increasing rights violations.

Senator Carr told ABC's Lateline he was not convinced the Sri Lankan government was engaging in human rights abuses.

''I think some of the stories that have been put to us, when we've checked them out haven't been sustained,'' he said.

He also pointed to evidence of improvements in the country when it came to human rights and said boycotting CHOGM would be counter-productive. ''I think the concerns we've got about human rights in Sri Lanka are best met through engagement with that country,'' he said.

But Senator Milne, who last year visited Sri Lanka and heard of some of the atrocities committed there, said the Australian government's position could not be sustained.

She said Australia should follow Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper's example and refuse to attend the summit unless there were dramatic improvements in Sri Lanka.

Mr Harper does not believe claims made by the Sri Lankan government that it killed only Tamil Tiger rebels and not Tamil civilians.

He told his country's question period last week that without major reform in Sri Lanka he would not personally go to the meeting in Colombo.

''I know we are deeply troubled by the direction in Sri Lanka and the fact that Sri Lanka is, at this point, the host of the next Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting,'' he said.

''I know suggestions have been made of any number of countries who would be willing to host that.''

Senator Carr appeared to dismiss Canada's position and said all Commonwealth countries were expected to attend the summit.

''Apart from Canada, I can identify no other country in the 55-member Commonwealth that would not be represented at Colombo,'' Senator Carr said.

But Senator Milne said the government's excuse for not taking a stronger stance was weak.

It was trying to bring about change by engaging with Sri Lanka, which would work only if Australia was prepared to be blunt.

But the government wanted asylum seeker issues ''off its plate'' before the election and so would not properly engage Sri Lanka, she said.

''It really is a closed loop between the Australian government, the Sri Lankan government and the churn of asylum seekers, and no questions asked about what actually is going on in Sri Lanka as we speak,'' she said.

''If Australia, being on the UN Security Council, wants to be taken seriously in this region as a middle power, then we've got to be seen to be putting at the head of our agenda the strengthening of human rights.

''It should not be pushing it to the bottom of the agenda beneath domestic political considerations in relation to an election and asylum seekers.''

Prime Minister Julia Gillard did not comment, a spokeswoman saying there was nothing to add to Senator Carr's remarks.

Asylum seekers have been political footballs to politicians and human rights abuses have been ignored along the way. Concentration camps are run under contract by some of the worst organisations in the world - Serco and G4S are the two which come to mind - and everything that goes on in the camps is, as it were, behind closed doors - literally. People who have tried to go to Nauru and Manus Island to see for themselves what is going on there, find it almost impossible to get access, and this is yet another example of the way the federal government wishes to hide their disgrace from the public gaze.

They prefer to treat asylum seekers as "others" - people who are "different" from us - they are not white middle class anglos - they are - what???

Through our media and politicians we tell the Australian population that these people will take away their jobs, that they have these strange religions and customs which are alien to our "way of life" and we will become tainted by them!

The fact is, this is a country of migrants and asylum seekers and was ever thus after displacing and killing off the indigenous population and treating them with apartheid disdain to rot in their own "outback" concentration camps.

I started this petition some time ago when the federal government and its friendly opposition were vying with each other to see who could torture people who had already been traumatised by their persecution due to wars which Australia had been busy fighting in countries with which it had no right to be involved in.

People quickly lost interest in the issue because of other scandals blowing up around that time and subsequently the two concentration camps used by the Howard government were found to be useful for incarcerating those managing to get to Australia alive!

It is time to resurrect the petition and ask you to get your friends to sign it too. Thanks for your assistance in this humanitarian crisis.

Stop Australian Incarceration of Asylum Seekers

http://www.thepetitionsite.com/13/stop-australian-incarceration-of-asylum-seekers/

Target: Australians and International communities
Sponsored by: Mannie De Saxe, Lesbian and Gay Solidarity, Melbourne

Australia is trying to negotiate an off-shore solution to Asylum Seekers coming to Australia in boats which are not seaworthy, and which have already been responsible for many drownings offshore. The latest attempt is the so-called Malaysian solution involving Australia sending 800 asylum seekers to Malaysia in exchange for 2000 refugees in Malaysia. Both the Australian Government and its parliamentary Opposition are demonising people fleeing desperate situations in their countries of origin, mainly because of Australian military intervention in those countries.

The total numbers of asylum seekers trying to enter Australia is a miniscule number in terms of refugees and asylum seekers around the world, and most of the people in Australia illegally have arrived by plane!

Australia is signatory to United Nations conventions on refugees but is ignoring these UN documents in its political attempts to stop the demonised "boat people" ever setting foot in Australia.

Help to obtain justice for Asylum Seekers in desperate situations.

The situation has worsened with the federal government reopening the concentration camps on Nauru and Manus Island.

Get the government to close these camps now.

____________________________________________

To highlight the crimes committed by our governments in the name of "border protection" - lies if ever there WERE any! - come some more alarming stories from our infamous concentration camps. The following item was in The Age newspaper on 29 APRIL 2013:

Refugee advocates push to end detention

By Thomas O'Byrne
Demonstrators demand refugee rights.

Refugee advocates have rallied outside a Broadmeadows detention centre following two suicide attempts at the facility last week.

More than 200 people assembled outside the Melbourne Immigration Transit Accommodation site on Sunday, pushing for an end to mandatory detention. Organisers said their action was precipitated by the two attempted suicides last Wednesday, one involving a 17-year-old Iraqi boy.

Among the crowd was a former asylum seeker who said public support, in the form of letters and rallies, helped his fellow detainees deal with depression and suicidal thoughts. ''I did not have a name. I was number 27,'' he said, declining to be named. ''We were dehumanised.''

Rally organiser Lucy Honan said it was unfortunate it had taken the tragedies at the detention centre to shine a light on the issue. ''We want to send a message to the two major political parties that there are members in the community for whom this is an election issue,'' she said.

ROW BREAKS OUT IN CHAMBERS AS AUSSIE PARLIAMENTARIANS CRITICIZE 'STUDY TOUR' OF ISRAEL

The following report was received from Mondoweiss by email on 16 March 2013:

Row breaks out in chambers as Aussie Parliamentarians criticizes ‘study tour’ of Israel

Mar 15, 2013 By Annie Robbins

A shouting match broke out in the chambers of the New South Wales (NSW) Legislative Council chambers on Thursday during a motion debate about a 'Study Mission to Israel' hosted by the NSW Parliamentary Friends of Israel under the auspices of the NSW Jewish Board Of Deputies, attended by a delegation of NSW Parliamentarians last January 6-10.

The purpose of the 'Study Mission' was "to build an understanding amongst the delegates of the complex and various issues impacting on Israel and other jurisdictions within the Middle East."(pdf)

While Legislative Council members who were part of the delegation sang the praises of Israel, Greens Legislative Councillor David Shoebridge (video above), Labor Legislative Councillors Shaoquett Moselmane, and Lynda Voltz had a few other topics to discuss.

The Jerusalem Post reported on it here, and below is the transcript of a portion of the debate, it gets wild, I recommend:

Mr DAVID SHOEBRIDGE [10.28 p.m.]: I speak to this motion and note at the outset that it is a very unbalanced one. Indeed, a member asked if The Greens took part in this study mission to Israel. As far as I am aware, no Greens member of Parliament went on this study mission. That was primarily because of the one-sided nature of the itinerary, which is reflected in the one-sided nature of this motion. In a motion that purports to talk about building an understanding of the complex and various issues impacting on Israel and other jurisdictions within the Middle East, it is extraordinary that in the more than 100 words and five paragraphs of this motion not one word is mentioned about Palestine or the Palestinians. The human rights of the Palestinians are airbrushed out of the motion, just as they were airbrushed out of the itinerary of the study tour that travelled to Israel and some very small parts of the West Bank. Having heard the contributions of members who went on the study tour and having read the motion, I can see that this is little more than a public relations exercise for the Israeli Government. Indeed, this public relations exercise has been run in part through the offices of the NSW Jewish Board of Deputies which arranged the tour and, I understand, partly paid for the study trip to Israel.

For the record, I do not recall getting an invitation from the Jewish Board of Deputies for this visit. However, had I received one I would not have accepted the invitation to go on this study trip because of the extraordinarily one-sided itinerary provided to members. If the Parliamentary Friends of Israel were interested in building an understanding of the complex issues in the Middle East, as they purport to be, their itinerary should have included a couple of other places to visit. First, the itinerary should have included visits outside the limited confines of Israel, Jerusalem and Bethlehem. How could members of this Chamber who wanted to get a balanced understanding of the issues facing the Israelis, the Palestinians and the Middle East travel to that part of the world and not meet with any members of the Palestinian Legislative Council, or at least those members of the Palestinian Legislative Council not currently being held in Israeli jails, many of them without trial and without being charged with any criminal offence?

How could members go there and meet with only one of the legislative bodies, the Knesset, and ignore the Palestinian Legislative Council? How could members, who wanted to get a balanced understanding of the issues facing Israel, Palestine and the Middle East, go to the other side of the planet and fail to visit Gaza, the world's largest outdoor prison? How could members not go to see the way the Palestinians live under the illegal blockade or not speak to the local health workers about the conditions in Gaza, or the paramedics about how they respond to the impacts of aerial bombardments by the Israeli military? If they had visited Gaza they would have been able to see the X-rays that the Gaza doctors show of children's kidneys riddled with kidney stones because of the saline water they are required to drink. The Israeli wells on the edge of Gaza are stripping out the fresh water from the arterial basin and the arterial basin is filling up with saline water from the sea. That saline water fills the wells. Most of the water treatment plants have been destroyed by Israeli bombardments and almost every child in Gaza has kidneys riddled with kidney stones and ongoing health problems.

Next time members should go to Gaza, look at the children, look at the damage, look at the X-rays and get some balance in their visit. If they had gone to Gaza surely they would then have gone to the West Bank and outside Bethlehem and Jerusalem and spoken to Palestinian villagers whose lives and livelihoods have been destroyed by the apartheid wall. Talk to the farmers whose olive groves have been cut off by the illegal apartheid wall, who cannot get to the fields that generations of their family had previously tended because of an illegal apartheid wall built by Israel through the middle of their homes, villages and farms. Surely members could also have met with Israeli peace activists, such as Jeff Halper from the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions, and spoken to Palestinians who have been illegally evicted from their homes and land to make way for internationally condemned settlements being built by the Israelis.

But, no. Members spoke to the Israeli settlers but they did not visit and speak to the people who have been evicted illegally for these internationally condemned, unlawful settlements that are now riddling the West Bank. How could members not have travelled to Hebron and done the Breaking the Silence tour, where former Israeli soldiers would have told them about what goes on in the occupied territories, about the violence and the discrimination perpetrated by the Israeli military and the settler movement against the native Palestinian population? Or were they Israeli voices that members wanted to edit out and not hear? The inconvenient truth.

The Hon. Dr Peter Phelps: What about the Qatar and Hamas civil war? What about what Qatar and Hamas do to each other? Did you go to the police building in Gaza? Did you go to the town hall in Gaza where they chuck people off? Did you go to the police building in Ramallah where they throw people out the window?

Mr DAVID SHOEBRIDGE: It is the inconvenient truth of the illegal, violent, discriminatory and brutal occupation in the West Bank.

DEPUTY-PRESIDENT (The Hon. Paul Green): Order! It is disorderly to interject.

Mr DAVID SHOEBRIDGE: How could members not visit the Palestinian refugee camps in neighbouring countries such as Lebanon, where Palestinian refugees from 1948, 1967 and beyond live in sub-standard Third World conditions?

The Hon. Dr Peter Phelps: What is the right of return for Vietnamese refugees?

The Hon. Lynda Voltz: Point of order: Members speaking in this debate have been heard in silence. Some members may not agree with other views expressed in the Chamber, but members should be allowed to express their views in a democratic way. I ask you to stop members of this Chamber from yelling down other members with whose views they may disagree.

DEPUTY-PRESIDENT (The Hon. Paul Green): Order! There is a motion on the floor and members are entitled to share their views.

The Hon. Dr Peter Phelps: I'm just reminding him that there are two sides to the story.

DEPUTY-PRESIDENT (The Hon. Paul Green): Order! There are diverse views in this Chamber and, in terms of protocol, they are entitled to be heard in silence.

Mr DAVID SHOEBRIDGE: How could members not visit those Palestinian refugee camps in neighbouring countries such as Lebanon, where Palestinian refugees from 1948, 1967 and beyond live in sub-standard Third World conditions and are denied their human right to return to their homes? Members did not speak to them, see their title deeds and see the keys they still hold for the homes that were taken from them in the illegal occupations and evictions that have been taking place for decades in that part of the world? It is extraordinary to note that Labor members, one of whom is notionally from the Left, visited Israel and small parts of the West Bank but did not travel to Nablus and meet with any of the Palestinian trade unions. How could members have travelled over there and not spoken to the firefighters in the Nablus fire station who were locked into their compound by Israeli tanks and snipers and prevented from doing their job as firefighters? They were prevent from savings the lives and homes of their families and friends for days and days as homes burned; children and other people died while the Israeli military shelled and burned their city around them.

The motion is not balanced; the visit to Israel was not balanced. It was not about getting an understanding of the complex and various issues but, rather, about getting a narrow part of the Israeli understanding. For members who went on such an unbalanced tour and failed to see the balanced truth, the oppression the Palestinian people face daily as a result of the illegal occupation of Israel, and to support this motion and preach to the rest of the Chamber about truth, understanding, peace and non-violence is extraordinary.

The Hon. SHAOQUETT MOSELMANE [10.48 a.m.]: All people have a right to a homeland—all people, including Jews, Kurds, Armenians and Palestinians. All people have a right to exist and receive the protections under international law and live in peace and security. Since the 1948 United Nations resolution to divide Palestine between the Jews and Arabs, the Palestinian people have been left to suffer the indignity and trauma of people dispossessed. I am not surprised that there is no mention in the motion of the Palestinian people, the Palestinian land, the Palestinian suffering, the Palestinian rights as people deprived of their land, persecuted, imprisoned, killed, traumatised and dehumanised. I wonder whether the members on their study mission considered the Palestinian people; I wonder whether the human rights of the Palestinian people crossed their minds. I hope it did cross their minds and that they pondered a little about the human rights of others now being dispossessed of their land, their dreams, their aspirations and their future as a people. Ever since 1948 the Israeli Zionist plan has been acquiring territory to expand the borders of the Jewish colonial state. Zionist ideology demanded—

The Hon. Walt Secord: Point of order: My point of order is on relevance. The member is not speaking to the motion and as the Deputy Chair of the Parliamentary Friends of Israel I disassociate myself from his remarks.

The Hon. Dr Peter Phelps: To the point of order: This is a fairly broad-ranging motion. While the member's speech is not directly relevant to the wording of the motion, it would be unfair if the member were not allowed to continue to speak, considering the breadth of topic that has been debated in relation to this motion.

DEPUTY-PRESIDENT (The Hon. Paul Green): Order! The Hon. Shaoquett Moselmane may resume his speech. He is within the latitude of the general purpose of the motion.

The Hon. SHAOQUETT MOSELMANE: After the United Nations allocated 56 per cent of the Palestinian territory to a Jewish State, 80 per cent was seized by force. Christians and Muslims made up two-thirds of the population. Jews, who owned only 6 per cent of the land, have now taken 85 per cent of the former Palestine land. The 800,000 who were initially dispossessed, expelled from their land—now five million—live in diaspora. There was nothing fair or legitimate about the United Nations' offer. It was carried out over the objections of the majority, but even this corruption of justice was not enough to satisfy the craving to take over people's land. Arab voices were ignored. Not a single Arab was consulted on the plan. Now five million Palestinians are scattered across the globe and those still living in their homeland are living in two non-contiguous territories—Gaza and the West Bank—which makes up less than 20 per cent of the territory they originally had after 1967. I believe it is more like 14 per cent of the former Palestine that they now live in. Members will see from this plan the former Palestine territory and the land that Palestinians now own, just spots of land scattered all over.

The Hon. Walt Secord: Point of order: The member is using props. The use of props is out of order.

DEPUTY-PRESIDENT (The Hon. Paul Green): Order! The member would be well aware that the protocol of the House is that members should not use props to support their arguments.

The Hon. SHAOQUETT MOSELMANE: The Palestinians' right to return to their homeland is a fundamental right of all people. It is a fundamental right that is at the heart of the Palestinian struggle. This must be addressed and resolved fairly. In all the speeches made in the House today, we have not heard about the Israeli assaults on Arab territories in 1956, 1967, 1982, 2006 and 2009. In the 2009 assault on Gaza 1,000 residents were killed, over 300 of them children, and 5,000 were wounded. As was described by a member earlier today, Gaza is the world's largest open-air prison camp, containing 1.5 million people in a very small parcel of land. The Israeli assault continues on Gaza. According to the Al-Mezan Center for Human Rights, some 90,000 Gazans were forced to flee their homes. Residents of Gaza city and to the north had no water and no electricity; they were trapped, traumatised and terrorised. Nothing was said in this debate about the rights of those Palestinians, who were effectively murdered by this military machine. They did not have hospitals. The Israeli military machine effectively erased government buildings, apartment buildings and mosques, and it struck United Nations schools, as well as the compound of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, ambulances and hospitals. Their actions can be seen as violation of international humanitarian law.

The International Committee of the Red Cross accused Israel of breaches of humanitarian conventions for failing to bring assistance to wounded and starving civilians and preventing ambulance access for four days. B'Tselem, Physicians for Human Rights and other Israeli human rights groups have described civilians being fired on in doorways by Israeli soldiers, attacks on ambulance crews and aid workers, and schools being used as civilian refuges. The Human Rights Watch accused Israel of using white phosphorous munitions over densely populated areas of Gaza in violation of international humanitarian law. The United Nations Human Rights Council has condemned the Israeli offensive for "massive violations of human rights". Amnesty International says that Israeli shelling of residential areas is "prima facie evidence of war crimes". The organisation has also accused Israeli soldiers of using Palestinians as human shields:

It's standard practice for Israeli soldiers to go into a house, lock up the family in a room on the ground floor and use the rest of the house as a military base.

Richard Falk, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Palestinian Territories and Professor Emeritus of International Law at Princeton University, says that Israel is in breach of the United Nations Charter, the Geneva conventions, international law and international humanitarian law. Falk says:

If there were the political will there could be an ad hoc tribunal established to hear allegations of war crimes. This could be done by the general assembly acting under article 22 of the UN charter which gives them the authority to establish subsidiary bodies.

But they did not do so. A Human Rights Watch investigation found that Israel had repeatedly and indiscriminately fired white phosphorus over crowded areas of Gaza, killing and injuring civilians—

The Hon. Walt Secord: Point of order: My point of order relates to relevance. I remind the honourable member that the motion states:

That this House notes that:

(a) The NSW Parliamentary Friends of Israel under the auspices of the NSW Jewish Board of Deputies hosted a delegation of New South Wales Parliamentarians on a study mission to Israel from 6 January 2013 to 10 January 2013—

The Hon. Lynda Voltz: You cannot read the whole motion.

The Hon. Walt Secord: I am just reminding the member of the motion.

The Hon. Lynda Voltz: Get to your point of order.

The Hon. Walt Secord: It was relevance.

The Hon. Lynda Voltz: Relevance has already been raised.

The Hon. Walt Secord: This speech is simply an anti-Israel rant.

The Hon. Lynda Voltz: You are trying to stop democratic debate in the Chamber.

The Hon. Walt Secord: This is simply an anti-Israel rant and he is not speaking to the motion.

The Hon. SHAOQUETT MOSELMANE: That is rubbish, and you know that.

DEPUTY-PRESIDENT (The Hon. Paul Green): Order! The Hon. Walt Secord is correct. Members have the motion in front of them, or have access to the motion. While I have been generous in general about speeches, the Hon. Shaoquett Moselmane needs to stay within the purview of the motion and not give a lengthy history.

The Hon. SHAOQUETT MOSELMANE: If ever there were a group in need of protection from war crimes, crimes against humanity and ethnic cleansing it is the Palestinians, and yet the Palestinians receive little outside help.

The Hon. Dr Peter Phelps: They received billions from the UN.

The Hon. SHAOQUETT MOSELMANE: In 1982 Israel invaded Lebanon.

The Hon. Dr Peter Phelps: Billions.

The Hon. SHAOQUETT MOSELMANE: Deputy-President, I did not interrupt other speakers. I let them make their speeches without interruption. Previous speakers had the opportunity to speak without interruption and I ask that the same courtesy to be shown to me. I have only four minutes left to speak. I have the right to inject some balance into this debate. I am glad that I am a member of this House and have the opportunity to speak and inject balance and humanity into this debate. I have that right and I have four minutes to do so.

The Hon. Matthew Mason-Cox: Point of order: Could the Hon. Shaoquett Moselmane retire while I take my point of order?

DEPUTY-PRESIDENT (The Hon. Paul Green): Order! The Hon. Shaoquett Moselmane will retire to his seat while a point of order is taken, as per the protocols of the House.

The Hon. Matthew Mason-Cox: I have listened with tolerance to the member. I take a point of order based on relevance. This is a motion about a study mission to Israel and members have noted the facts in relation to that study mission. The Hon. Shaoquett Moselmane did not even go on the study mission. He is having a little rant about personal issues. The motion is about a study mission to Israel, nothing more, nothing less. The House has been more than tolerant in listening to some of the garbage that he has been talking about.

The Hon. Trevor Khan: To the point of order. Whilst I agree with the Hon. Matthew Mason-Cox with regard to the words of the motion, speakers have raised a very broad range of matters. It is my argument that having allowed broad discretion in the debate so far and, to be frank, having allowed a scab to be picked, the Hon. Shaoquett Moselmane is entitled to have his say. He has only a few minutes left in which to speak.

DEPUTY-PRESIDENT (The Hon. Paul Green): Order! I ask the Hon. Shaoquett Moselmane to address his remarks to the motion. Mr David Shoebridge was given an opportunity to speak on a range of matters and I will extend the same latitude to the Hon. Shaoquett Moselmane.

The Hon. SHAOQUETT MOSELMANE: As I stated, all people have a right to a peaceful existence and so do the Palestinian people. I want this House to know that and I want that comment to be recorded. They as well as the Jewish people have a right to peaceful existence and to a homeland. We have heard comments about how peaceful and democratic the Israeli Government is. I remind the House that in 1982 when Israel invaded Lebanon and then occupied Lebanon for 18 years they imprisoned people. People in southern Lebanon were tortured. I visited the camps and I saw the prisons. I invite members to go to these torture camps that the Israelis set up in southern Lebanon and see for themselves. They occupied Lebanon for 18 years. I resent members here accusing the resistance of being terrorist groups. I salute the resistance.

If the resistance in Lebanon had not forced the Israelis out of Lebanon I would not have been able to go to my grandparents' home in southern Lebanon and visit the land I was born in. I salute them for their resistance. It is the right of people to do so. Imagine what the response would have been in 1941 or 1942 if we had condemned resistance against Nazi Germany. Guns would have been blazing at us for not resisting Nazi Germany. In Lebanon the resistance was able to force the Israelis out. In 2006, towards the end of the Israeli war on Lebanon, they dumped three million cluster bombs in little southern Lebanon. Those three million bombs are buried in the ground. A child walking on the ground will be blown up or lose a limb. An animal walking around will die. Three million cluster bombs will exist for hundreds of years and people will continue to suffer. In conclusion— [Time expired.]

The Hon. LYNDA VOLTZ [11.03 a.m.]: While I did not go on this Israeli study tour I have travelled to Israel and Palestinian, including Gaza and the West Bank, on a number of occasions. Unlike my colleague Mr David Shoebridge, if I received an invitation from the Jewish Board of Deputies to go on a tour of Israel I would certainly take them up on the offer because I am a strong believer in the notion that travel broadens the mind and that you should always listen to a person's point of view with an open mind. Travel should expose us to beliefs that are contrary to our own and challenge some of our views, particularly of history and international politics.

However, if the reports of the study tour I have heard are anything to go by, I doubt there was any significant challenge to the existing views of those who went on the tour. As I am sure the Hon. David Clarke will agree, in the past I have discussed the issue of Palestine with him. I have also discussed it with other members of the Chamber. While we may not agree it does not mean I do not respect his views. I understand his views because I have had a lengthy discussion with him about them. Certainly the Jewish Board of Deputies are entitled to put their case in relation to the way they see the situation. I do not think anyone in the Chamber disagrees with that.

It is important as members of Parliament to remember to ensure there is balance in the views we express in this Chamber. I do not think balance has been expressed in the debate arising out of this study tour. I note that one of the few meetings with someone whose views may not have reflected those of the Israeli Government was with Abdel Fattah Hamayel, the Governor of Bethlehem, who is appointed by the Palestinian Authority. It is interesting that none of the reports by members included the views of the Governor of Bethlehem. In particular, I wonder whether some of the outrage that was expressed in this Chamber over the campaign of boycotts, divestment and sanctions [BDS] was relayed to the Governor who undertakes inspections of local shops to ensure that no products from illegal Israeli settlements are sold anywhere within Bethlehem. It is also interesting that the tour did not meet with the democratically elected mayor of Bethlehem given all the support for democracy being voiced around this Chamber.

The Hon. Dr Peter Phelps: I met with him.

The Hon. LYNDA VOLTZ: It is a woman, so I doubt you met with him.

The full debate can be found here.

The following video is from Antony Loewenstein's blog detailing some of what is in the Mondoweiss report above:

MARTIN FERGUSON AND THE FEDERAL SEAT OF BATMAN

The results of the 2010 federal election were illuminating in many ways, not least of which was the fact that the Australian Labor Party (ALP) was losing support and popularity, the Coalition was not faring much better, and the Greens were the party that gained most in the election.

The Labor Party was only able to form government after it reached agreements with some independents and the Greens, who, for the first time, gained a seat in the lower house and gained the balance of power in the upper house, the Senate.

What this is leading up to is the fact that Batman, a long-time Labor-held seat in the northern suburbs of Melbourne had always had the biggest margin of any Labor seat in Australia. This all changed in the 2010 election when the Greens substantially reduced that margin and showed that with some more resources and some greater pressure, Martin Ferguson's stronghold could be at the end of its road.

Ferguson was for some years involved with the Liquor, Hospitality and Miscellaneous Workers Union (LHMU) in New South Wales, after which he became the president of the Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU). He left that to become the Labor federal member for Batman, a seat he has now held for many years.

To digress briefly, in 2011 the Jewish Community Council of Victoria (JCCV) suddenly decided that there were some Jewish people who were gay, lesbian, transgender and HIV (GLTH) members of the Victorian communities, and decided to ask for submissions from them as to what they required of the JCCV to assist them as Jews who might be suffering from discrimination and other forms of abuse from the Jewish communities in Victoria.

The result of their request for submissions, to be assessed by a sub-committee in the JCCV (who were supposedly chosen for their connections to, and experience with, GLTH members of the Jewish communities in Victoria), was that they received a total of five submissions and this sub-committee then issued a report, at last naming members of this sub-committee which had demanded secrecy because they feared intimidation from GLTH people!!!!!

Back to Martin Ferguson, who, at the request of members of the ALP and Greens, was supposed to do a survey of his constituents to find out what their attitude to same-sex marriage was, and then to report back to parliament.

Now anybody can skew results to suit their agendas and Ferguson appears to have done just that.

A report issued during the week of 18 April 2012 which may or may not be a media release from Ferguson's office stated that Batman had bucked the trend by opposing changes to the Marriage Act.

Now here is the nitty gritty of the statement: Ferguson is not releasing the number of respondents or percentage breakdown of his survey.

Batman has a large GLTH community and those of us who live in this federal seat of Batman have by and large generally not encountered hostility, homophobia, unpleasantness or other manifestations of opposition.

We challenge Ferguson to produce the results of his survey and to show how much of the opposition he is quoted as talking about comes from religious groups opposed to homosexuality, not to mention same-sex marriages.

Ferguson's position on many issues is open to question, such as his support for nuclear energy, for uranium export, for brown coal export, and his own stand on same-sex relationships is an indication of his general conservatism on many issues.

Hopefully at the next election, Ferguson will no longer represent the voters of Batman and we will have someone in the federal parliament who is actually a political progressive.

Just don't hold your breath!!

SENATOR BOSWELL, CHECK THE NUMBERS IN AUSTRALIA WHO SUPPORT BDS AGAINST ISRAEL, THE APARTHEID STATE!

The following article appeared in The Age on 6 July 2011. The Age, of course, supports Senator Boswell and attacks the Greens, because Fairfax journalists have been well represented in the groups who go on junkets to Israel paid for, or supported by The AIJAC in Australia. Participants have included Gillard, Rudd and members of both major political parties in federal parliament. They all profess undying love for Israel - what arms deals do Israel and Australia do with each other?

DON'T ASK, DON'T TELL!!

Vote to embarrass Greens on Israel

Richard Willingham
July 6, 2011

(photo not available at the moment)
New Greens senator Lee Rhiannon. Photo: Jacky Ghossein

GREENS Leader Bob Brown has failed to ''put his money where his mouth is'' by voting against a Senate motion condemning a boycott of Israel, a policy supported by new senator Lee Rhiannon, according to the Nationals' Ron Boswell.

Senator Rhiannon, one of four new Greens in the Senate, backed a Sydney local council and New South Wales Greens position for a boycott of Israel.

Senator Brown called the policy ''a mistake'', saying it cost votes at March's NSW state election. ''It's not our policy and won't be,'' Senator Brown said in April.
A motion by Senator Boswell that ''condemns the boycott of Israel instigated by Marrickville Council'' passed the Senate with the support of Labor and the Coalition. The Greens voted against it.

''Senator Brown had the opportunity to put his money where his mouth was and instead he chose to vote with his extremist colleague Lee Rhiannon, a known supporter of the boycott,'' Senator Boswell said. ''Brown has failed to pull her into line. By failing to support this motion Senator Brown has failed at the first hurdle.''
The motion also recognised Israel as a legitimate and democratic state and ''a good friend of Australia''.

Senator Brown was unavailable for comment last night.

RICHARD WILLINGHAM