Piers Akerman: Albanese should visit massacre site, not turn spotlight away from Hamas’s atrocities

The death of an aid worker in Gaza is a most unfortunate incident but Anthony Albanese has used it in an attempt to undermine international support for Israel’s attempt to eradicate a Hamas and protect its citizens, writes Piers Akerman.

The utterings of Anthony Albanese are, to borrow from Shakespeare, but “a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing”. Expressing disproportionate rage over the tragic but accidental death of Australian aid worker Zomi Frankcom exposed the dizzying heights of Albanese’s (and Foreign Minister Penny Wong’s) hypocritical approach to the whole Gaza conflict. Neither has contributed anything toward a speedy resolution. Both have danced to the terrorists’ tune.

If Albanese wanted to make a mark on the international stage instead of merely playing up to Muslims in seats held by his ministers Tony Burke and Ed Husic, he could demand that Qatar stop hosting key Hamas leaders. Or that Qatar, a principal funder of Hamas, pressure the terrorists to immediately release the remaining 134 hostages – and the bodies of those estimated to have died in captivity since October 7, up to half of them. But Albanese is playing the emotional card, as is the ABC with its relentless prosecution of heart-rending pleas from aid organisations for a unilateral ceasefire with no demands on Hamas to release its captives or stop using Gazans as human shields.

Anthony Albanese has forgotten what the real atrocity of the current war between Israel and Hamas, writes Piers Akerman. Picture: Oren ZIV / AFP

Albanese told a sympathetic ABC radio interviewer on Thursday’s AM program “we need a full, transparent and clear explanation for how this occurred” it must be published and the Netanyahu government “must be held accountable”. The Israeli government has promised just that and sacked two officers and reprimanded three others for their roles in the disastrous missile strike. Unlike Hamas, which murders civilians and is delighted when Gazans are killed, the Israeli defence forces take greater care to limit the number of civilian casualties than any other military in the world.

Albanese noted the vehicles carrying the unfortunate young Australian woman and her colleagues were clearly identified as being from the World Central Kitchen, but he didn’t say the strike occurred at night. To the best of my knowledge, a convoy in a designated conflict zone travelling by night is more likely to be carrying terrorists than aid workers.

As Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said, these things happen in war. Albanese knows as much about war as he knows about full and transparent investigations. His experience of warfare has been limited to adolescent fighting against Tories, a practice he has yet to grow out of. He has shut down more inquiries than he has opened and his government has been less accountable for its insane actions than any previous administration.

Even the Open Government Forum, the government body supposed to promote transparency, is noted for refusing Freedom Of Information requests about its operation and how its members, public servants and non-government representatives vote on issues.

Israel’s preliminary investigation concluded there was no deliberate attack against the WCK body’s aid workers. IDF chief of staff Lieutenant-General Herzi Halevi said the “severe incident is the result of a mistaken identification under complex conditions, at night, during a war. This should not have happened”.

Albanese has used this most unfortunate incident in an attempt to undermine international support for Israel’s attempt to eradicate a designated terrorist group and protect its citizens. He has tried to turn the spotlight away from Hamas and its deliberate attack on civilians and equate the greatest slaughter of unarmed Jews since the Holocaust with the accidental death of one person, albeit an Australian aid worker, during an intense war.

Albanese should visit the site of the October 7 massacre, speak with those who know what war is and learn something before making a reckless fool of himself again.

Originally published as Piers Akerman: Albanese should visit massacre site, not turn spotlight away from Hamas’s atrocities