by Geoff Vasil
The Australian media, former Australian ambassador to Australia Dave Sharma, Jewish community leader Alex Ryvchin and a series of Australian politicians on both sides of the aisle are saying Israeli-Australian relations are at an all-time low.
This followed a tweet by Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu calling Australian PM Anthony Albanese a weak leader who has failed to protect Australian Jews.
Albanese appeared to brush off the criticism and told the press he tries to deal with international leaders respectfully.
Shortly after a letter Netanyahu had sent Albanese several days earlier leaked in the media. The letter accused Albo of pouring fuel on the fire of anti-Semitism in Australia and called him a coward in so many words for appeasing Hamas with recognition of Palestinian statehood.
Albanese didn’t comment publicly on that letter but sympathetic media claimed it was some sort of gorm letter which French president Emanuel Macron had also received.
The content of the letter indicated otherwise. Netanyahu mentioned two recent coordinated attacks on Jews in Melbourne–horrific but by no means the worst of the numerous violent attacks on Jews over the past 2.5 years which included more successdul firebombings of synagogues, the torching of a daycare center and many others–which targeted jews at Sabbath dinner inside a synagogue and a terror attack on diners at an Israeli restaurant there.
Albanese used a similar deflection earlier last week when at least three Hamas officials praised him for recognizing Palestine. At first Albanese claimed Hamas didn’t suport a two-state solution and so wouldn’t welcome his support for a Palestinian state. When the opposite happened, Albanese and his supporters claimed the Hamas leader in question couldn’t have tweeted support for Australia’s policy because he was in an Israeli jail and incommunicado. Then it turned out his office had issued the statement, as Australia’s PMO often does. At least two more Hamas terrorists chimed in with support, plus there was earlier praise from Hamas for Australian Penny Wong’s anti-Israel position taken at a meeting of foreign ministers.
Following Netanyahu letter to Albanese and before it was made public, Australian home secretary Tony Burke promptly cancelled a visa for a member of the Israeli Knesset to come speak at Jewish institutions and schools in Australia, claiming it would disturb public order and sow discord. Burke earlier cancelled visas for a former Israeli government minister and other Israelis. He and Albanese also changed visa applications for Israelis several years ago to ask if they’ve served in the IDF and whether they’ve committed war crimes. Meanwhile Albanese and Burke decided they would admit Palestinian refugees from Gaza on tourist visas. Burke was forced to back down just last week when it came to light one Gazan female had praised the October 7 mass murder, praising Allah for letting her live to see that day. Visas for publicly outspoke foreign Muslim figures who praised the mass murder of Jews and one who attended Hezbollah leader Nasralla’s funeral in Beirut and then returned to Austalia have not been rescinded or apparently even reviewed by Burke’s Home Office.
After Netanyahu’s letter was made public, Burke gave a gruesome fireside-chat-like diatribe in a darkeend room to be broadcasted by state-run Australian media channel ABC in which he claimed Israeli was trying to starve as many children as possible.
Netanyahu responded directly with a friendly interview on Skynews Australia, part of the Rupert Murdoch media empire, reiterating Albanese’s weakness as a leader and his apparent lack of concern for the safety of Jewish Australians. He said Albanese was attempting to appease Hamas, and that that would backfire on Australia.
Somewhere in the middle of the private letter and the public polemics, US ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee was asked by Australian media whether the Trump administration had noticed Albaense’s shift in policy in favor of a Palestinian state. Huckabee said it was being discussed in Washington, D.C., and that Trump administration officials were disappointed and “even disgusted” by the new policy.
It is a new policy. Since 1948 when Australia was the first to recognize Israel at the UN and even before, both Labor and the Liberals in Australia have always supported Israel’s independence and independence of action in pushing back incursions by Palestinians and Arabs. Albanese’s new Labor bucks Australian political tradition in favor of some pro-Palestine university campus activism from the 1970s. In Albo’s case, it’s a knee-jerk reaction in favor of all things Palestine and against all things Israeli, read, Jewish.
IHRA at least in some its earlier definitions of “antisemitism” was always careful not to conflate criticism of Israeli policy per se with anti-Semitism, although pointing out that “excessive” criticism of Israel is an indication of a kind of anti-Semitism. Not all Jews are Israelis and many Jews don’t support Israel. The Left has sought to make the same argument regarding itself, claiming no anti0Semitism was involved in their decisions regarding support for anti-SEmitic terrorist groups and so on. The far left always has strayed into anti-Semitic territory, leading to paradoxes such as the Communist terror gang iRote Armee Faktion in West Germany targeting Israelis while decrying the Nazis’ murder of Jews. Much more recently Corbyn’s Labour Party in the UK was forced to change leadership and clean house in recognition of all the reasonable anti-Semites holding membership in the ranks.
Albanese’s anti-Semitism is of a similar vein. For him it’s all completely reasonable and logical. As he put it recently, you have to “back in” your own team, as in Australian football or rugby. Presumably he’s just backing the Palestinian team, rooting for the underdog as it were. Because that’s the kind of leftist he is, he was raised that way. In truth, the Albanese Government’s anti-Semitism is easy to see:
1. Allowing anti-Semitic marches with anti-Semitic chants and terrorist flags to take over the streets of the two main Australian cities o a regular basis while arrested Jews who hold up an Israeli flag;
2. Failing to stop repeated attacks on synagogues, schools, businesses and individuals and their private property while “denouncing” anti-Semitism, and almost always in the same breath adding “and Islamophobia is very bad, too;”
3. Granting and re-granting visas to anti-Israel terrorists while making visa applications for Israelis more difficult and denying Israelis entry on the basis of disruptions to public order.
It’s sort like the guy who says, “I’m not an anti-Semite, I just don’t like Jewish people!”
As much as it’s desirable to claim Albanese has neglected Australia’s Jews, as much as one wants to tell oneself it’s just about getting and keeping votes in western Sydney, it’s not. It’s a knee-jerk reaction against Jews in favor of Arabs and Muslims based on decades of hard-left self-indoctrination. Netanyahu didn’t go even nearly far enough in his criticism.
Predictably there are voices in Australia on different sides of politics who say Netayahu is provoking anti0Semitism in Australia, that Aussies will instinctively rally to fight an external threat, even Alex Ryvchin seems to be cowering in the corner and crying “Make it stop! Make it stop!” (while other Jewish groups think it’s about time this happened). The Liberal Party, the Nationals and other conservative politicians and reporters who have watching since the Hamas supporters chanted “Gas the Jews” on the Sydney Opera’s steps on October 9, 2023, however, all seem to more or less agree with Netanyahu, and most even agree that this was a long time coming, given the actions of the Albanese Government.
The words “cowardly” and “weal” aren’t just insults hurled here in what they used to call a “flame war” back in Internet 1.0. Up till 15 days ago or so, Albanese said Australia was in no ruch to recognize a Palestinian state. That all changed with Macron went for the nuclear option and self-destructed, followed by a timid Starmer and a somewhat less-commital Merz. All of a sudden Albanese found the inner courage to virtue-signal to his lefty friends he was in the cool kids’ club, too.
“Weak” is a bit more complicated. Australia’s economy is on the brink as much as Israeli-Australian relations are. Compared to 10 years ago, Australia has fallen into a Great Depression where the only growth in GDP is from “the public sector,” meaning hiring new bureaucrats at taxpayer expense. The public and private sectors are now 50-50 in Australia, half and half.
There’s also a complete decline in the Australian military and readiness. When asked by the US several years ago to supply resources to keep the Red Sea open to shipping–a route vital for Australian shipping to and from Europe–Albanese declined. A decades-long saga/scandal over purchases of submarines was swept under the rug, again, when Biden announced the AUKUS deal which was supposed to supply Virginia class subs to Australia. Cool story, bro. Mever happened. Will it, might it still happen? DoD in DC is reviewing the plan, and is asking Australia about its readiness capabilities or even intents to be ready to deflect outside threats in the Pacific. The Australian army is not attracting recruits. All of Australia’s defense eggs are in the American basket. The country is now 100% relying on the US to come to its aid if trouble starts.
In his interview on Skynews Australia, Netanyahu spoke about peace through strength, the old Reagan doctrine more recently resurrected by Trump. Netanyahu said strength attracts allies and deters enemies. At the same time Albanese is actively courting China and avoiding all contract with Trump and America. For a country 100% reliant on the US for defense, this is an odd caprice. Add to that Palestine and Albanese’s de facto anti-Semitism, and that’s almost three strikes, you’re out.
The opinions expressed here are purely those of the author and are not necessarily shared by the Lithuanian Jewish Community or any other organization.