Labor’s Green light for extremists
Mark Dreyfus has directed his second preference in Isaacs to Greens candidate Matthew Kirwan.
Jewish groups have expressed bitter disappointment at Labor directing preferences to the Greens, ignoring requests to put the far-left party last on how-to-vote cards.
Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus has directed his second preference in Isaacs to Greens candidate Matthew Kirwan, despite condemning the Greens numerous times for their divisive rhetoric.
Kirwan has called for sanctions and an arms embargo on Israel and last year joined an anti-Israel protest outside the office of Dreyfus’s party colleague Clare O’Neill.
“It is bitterly disappointing that a senior member of the government and an eminent Jewish Australian could see fit to instruct his supporters to put a ‘2’ next to a party that has done more to vilify the Jewish community than any party in Australian history,” Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ) co-CEO Alex Ryvchin said.
ECAJ president Daniel Aghion wrote to Dreyfus on Monday to express his “deep disappointment”.
“From your own public comments … we know that you are aware of how extreme the Greens’ politics have become,” Aghion wrote.
Aghion said that if Dreyfus had requested an open ticket similar to Macnamara MP Josh Burns, “we find it difficult to believe that the party would have refused your request”.
“We do not in any way under-rate the excellent work that has been done by you and your department in legislative reform and making security funding available to our community,” Aghion added.
Meanwhile, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has given his second preference to the Greens’ Hannah Thomas, who has accused Israel of genocide, while Education Minister Jason Clare has preferenced Greens candidate Omar Sakr, despite Sakr declaring, “Zionism is on the side of Nazis.”
Kingsford Smith MP Matt Thistlethwaite, who represents a large Jewish community, has also preferenced the Greens second.
Jewish Labor backbencher Mike Freelander has also put the Greens second.
Dreyfus declined to comment to The AJN.
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