Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has blamed the “extreme anti-Israeli position” of the Albanese government for the arson attack on a Melbourne synagogue on Thursday night.

“Unfortunately, it is impossible to separate this reprehensible act from the extreme anti-Israeli position of the Labor government in Australia, including the scandalous decision to support the UN resolution calling on Israel ‘to bring an end to its unlawful presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, as rapidly as possible’, and preventing a former Israeli minister from entering the country,” he said in a statement issued overnight.