Govt wrong

THEY say the road to hell is paved with good intentions. And after a positive start when Australia rightly condemned bias at the UN Human Rights Council, the federal Labor government now sadly appears to be headed down that road.

First the government committed to doubling funding to the Palestinian refugee agency UNRWA even though it is rife with corruption, spreads incitement in its schools, has employed members of Hamas and generally perpetuates the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Now, Labor has reversed Australia’s recognition of west Jerusalem – where the Knesset and High Court are located – as the capital of Israel. On the one hand, we shouldn’t be surprised; Foreign minister Penny Wong promised to do just that in 2018 when the Morrison government first announced the recognition.

But it is a mistake, whether or not one subscribes to the theory that the initial announcement was made for domestic political reasons.

Wong says Jerusalem is a final status issue to be resolved in any peace deal. But the portion of Jerusalem west of the “Green Line”, from the international community’s point of view, has never been in dispute. Recognising it as Israel’s capital would have no impact on negotiations, whereas reversing that recognition only encourages the Palestinian Authority’s intransigence.

In fact, arguably federal Labor’s platform of recognising a Palestinian state – whether acted on by the government or not – prejudices a negotiated outcome more.

Additionally, the way the reversal was announced is appalling. After The Guardian leaked on Monday that paragraphs on the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade’s website referencing Jerusalem had been removed, and up until mid-Tuesday morning, the Foreign Minister’s office was insisting to our communal roof bodies that Australia’s position hadn’t changed. Of course, that’s until Wong said it had.

It reflects poor treatment of an ally, and of our community, while we also note it came on Simchat Torah, when many Jews were in shule and the Israeli embassy was closed.

Indeed, Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid summed it up when he said, “We can only hope that the Australian government manages other matters more seriously and professionally.”