Jewish groups condemn new Labor platform on Israel
Jewish leaders condemn Labor's new Israel platform, warning key safeguards on Hamas and security were removed.
Executive Council of Australian Jewry co-chief executive Peter Wertheim said the worry was that the platform would become government policy.
“The concern is that the weakening of resolve to exclude Hamas from any role in governing a Palestinian state and to hold the Palestinian Authority to account for failing to honour its written commitments, as now enshrined in the ALP platform, will eventually become government policy,” he said.
Wertheim said the government was right that Australia could play a role in promoting harmony rather than conflict in the Middle East.
“That ambition is unlikely to be achieved by dispensing harsh criticisms to one side only, namely Israel, while going soft on the bad faith of the Palestinian Authority in failing to meet the written commitments it made to the Australian government to induce Australia to recognise a Palestinian state,” he said.
He said Australia should revive the partnership it formed with Britain and Canada when the three countries recognised a Palestinian state last year.
“That same partnership should now come together and publicly hold the Palestinian Authority to account for its conspicuous lack of progress in meeting its promises to reform its governance, terminate payments to the families of Palestinian prisoners, institute schooling reform and hold general elections. In essence, the Palestinian State needs to be told to act like one,” he said.
Wertheim said the three governments should also demand that Hamas disarm immediately.
“Large-scale investment for rebuilding will never flow into Gaza while Hamas remains armed and in control of any part of that territory. Until Hamas is disarmed, Palestinian statehood will remain a sham, a sham that Australia has helped to create,” he said.
The platform opposes illegal settlements and settler violence, and says sanctions may be imposed “as necessary” on settlements.
It condemns recent Israeli legislation permitting the death penalty for Palestinians who kill Israelis, and expresses support for the International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court.
It also states that Labor unreservedly condemns terrorism and violent extremism, including actions by Hamas.
Labor’s 2021 platform called for recognition of Palestine as a state, which the government granted in August last year.
The new platform was commended to the floor by Calwell MP Basem Abdo, who spoke jointly in favour of it with Macnamara MP Josh Burns under a procedure introduced by Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles.
The Australia/Israel & Jewish Affairs Council said it was relieved the conference had rejected what it called the “highly extreme and incendiary” Middle East proposal advanced by MP Ed Husic. AIJAC also welcomed Foreign Minister Penny Wong’s reaffirmation last week that Hamas must disarm, the Palestinian Authority must reform and Israel’s security must be guaranteed.
“Nonetheless, we are deeply disappointed that the National Conference has still adopted changes to the ALP National Platform that removed these explicit calls,” the organisation said, adding that the changes showed how far Labor was departing from Australia’s traditional bipartisan support for a negotiated two-state resolution.
Zionist Federation of Australia president Jeremy Leibler said democratic reform, an end to incentives for terrorism, demilitarisation, recognition of Israel and no role for Hamas remained central to Australia’s policy, but those principles were no longer reflected with the same clarity in Labor’s platform.
He said the platform imposed detailed obligations on Israel while placing far less emphasis on Palestinian leadership and Hamas, and urged the government to keep applying its stated conditions.
Macnamara MP Josh Burns has urged the community not to read too much into the outcome.
“The platform is a high-level statement of policy. It is not Government Policy, and it is not the law,” he told The AJN.
“It has been our longstanding policy that Hamas must disarm and have no future role in Palestinian governance, and that the Palestinian Authority must reform.”
Burns said that under Mark Dreyfus as Attorney-General, the government changed the law so that the listing of Hamas as a terrorist organisation could become permanent.
“None of that changed at National Conference. In fact, for the first time, Hamas is condemned in our National Platform,” he said.
“Instead of commenting from the sidelines, we chose to be part of the conversation to find common ground across the party.”
Burns told delegates Abdo had phoned him on the night of the Bondi terror attack to offer condolences, and joined him at Caulfield Synagogue the next evening.
Abdo said the motion was grounded in principles of international law, peace and justice.
The Calwell MP, a father of a one-year-old, spoke of Palestinians living under occupation and asked delegates to imagine telling a child they had to pass through a military checkpoint to reach school.
“Human dignity is universal,” he said.