Pro-Palestine supporters camp out on steps of Victorian parliament, ignoring pleas to cancel October 7 rally
Pressure is mounting on the Allan government to introduce a protest permit system with key lord mayoral hopefuls calling for powers to rein in the number of CBD rallies.
Victoria
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Pressure is mounting on the Allan government to introduce a protest permit system with key lord mayoral hopefuls Anthony Koutoufides and Arron Wood calling for powers to rein in the number of CBD rallies.
It comes as the NSW government explores expanding the state’s permit system to deny protest requests based on police resources.
Pro-Palestine groups have vowed to continue their weekly marches through the CBD as terrorist organisation Hezbollah singled out Melbourne and Sydney as the protest capitals, praising activist groups for their support.
In Victoria, it has been revealed, taxpayers have been slugged more than $4m, and more than 22,000 police resources have been dragged off the beat to deal with at least 52 pro-Palestine protests since Hamas’ October 7 terror attack reignited war in the Middle East.
Taxpayers also copped an extra $30m bill after violent protesters clashed with police outside the Land Forces weapons expo.
Mr Koutoufides said he would put pressure on the state government to introduce a protest permit system that would be managed by the City of Melbourne.
“The NSW government operates a permit system and I would like to see a similar system introduced in Melbourne,” he said.
Mr Koutoufides said hundreds of CBD protests this year had left locals and visitors feeling unsafe and were tipping struggling businesses over the edge. He also called for a designated area for protests.
“While we fundamentally respect our democratic rights to freedom of speech, our Charter of Human Rights requires us to consider the rights of those that live in the city, those that have businesses in the city, those that work in our city and those who commute and move through our city,” he said.
Fellow lord mayoral candidate Arron Wood said he would be in favour of a state government permit system that “ensures safety is prioritised and disruption is minimised”.
He said Melbourne “shouldn’t be known as Australia’s protest capital” as he called for a better balance between the democratic right to protest and the rights of businesses and residents.
When asked about a permit system, Lord Mayor Nick Reece would not say whether he was in favour but said he would “welcome the government looking at all options” that reduce disruption caused by protests.
Greens lord mayoral candidate Roxane Ingleton, however, said she was not in support of a permit system.
The Herald Sun understands the Victorian government would need to tweak legislation to grant local councils the power to establish their own protest permit systems.
It came as NSW Premier Chris Minns called for his state’s permit scheme to be expanded to enable the force to reject protests on grounds of stretched police resources. In Sydney, police are responsible for denying protest permits.
“When you’ve got someone putting in an application every seven days for 51 weeks to march through Sydney streets, this is costing millions of dollars,” Mr Minns told Sydney radio station 2GB.
“And I think taxpayers should be in a position to say we would prefer that money spent on roadside breath testing, domestic violence investigations, knife crimes.”
Victorian Police Association secretary Wayne Gatt said last week many police officers supported implementing a permit system similar to NSW.
“We think this is something that should be pursued,” Mr Gatt told 3AW. “We called for a similar system I think in 2019, 2020, effectively, when we had our members repeatedly going to far left and far right demonstrations, often at the same location.”
But Ms Allan continued to resist growing pressure to introduce the laws, claiming they were not effective and impinged on people’s rights.
The Premier’s refusal to restrict the weekly protests came as Free Palestine Melbourne representative Adnan Mansour – who led a protest of thousands through the CBD on the eve of the anniversary of Hamas’ October 7 attack – said demonstrators would not stop protesting until Israel ended its “genocide” in Gaza.
Pro-Palestine protesters take over steps of parliament
A controversial pro-Palestine rally launched on the grisly anniversary of the massacre of 1200 Israelis on Tuesday entered its second day after a group of protesters spent the night sleeping on the steps of Victoria’s parliament.
About 30 activists were at the parliament at 7.30am on Tuesday while more than a dozen Palestine flags lined bollards outside the building.
Signs saying “Justice for Palestine is peace for humanity” and “Free the people, free the land, justice is our demand” were secured to the posts.
About 8.30am, the group of demonstrators carried out a symbolic funeral procession, laying what appeared to be representations of dead Gaza civilians on the ground after walking to parliament Gardens.
“If this is what civilisation is, we don’t want to be civilised at all,” one protester said to the crowd.
“Shame on the world governments for allowing us to be in the way we are now.”
They then stood in silence for several minutes.
When asked about calls from the Jewish community and political leaders not to hold pro-Palestine vigils on October 7, Free Palestine Coalition representative Tasnim Sammak said the group’s actions promoted peace.
“One year on since the Israeli regime launched the genocidal campaign on Gaza, this is the time for reflection,” she said.
“This is a flag raising to insist that Palestine shall remain. Palestine will never die.
“It is time for a permanent ceasefire and an end to the occupation.”
The October 7 rally began about 6pm Monday as organisers ignored pleas from politicians and Jewish leaders to shift any action to another day.
Prams were draped with head scarfs and fake stretchers for the dead carried through Melbourne streets as hundreds gathered at the Marquis of Linlithgow Memorial.
Six mock stretchers of dead bodies draped in Palestinian flags were carried by participants before getting proceedings got underway.
A banner read protect Palestinian life”, with a solo drummer walking behind it playing a single steady beat.
The rest of the procession was split into groups, including a section dedicated to Melbourne’s Palestinian community.
That community gathered on the steps to pray, as the rest of the crowd spread out across the Parliament House steps and on Spring St.
After the prayers speakers took to the stage, including a local Indigenous woman who condemned both Australia and Israel as colonising states.
“Palestine has woken the fighting spirit of Aboriginal resistance and ending colonial liberation,” she said.
Tasnim Sammak, a Palestinian woman and lecturer at Monash University, was the first official speaker at the vigil.
She spoke of the “genocide of her people by Israel” and how “their annihilation was happening, with no one trying to stop it”.
“The complete annihilation of Gaza is the plans of Netanyahu,” she said.
“They have destroyed every single hospital, every single school and every single university.
“But when we say arrest Netanyahu, we are the ones found guilty.”
Teal candidate’s Oct 7 post slammed
A Teal candidate has been condemned for using the October 7 anniversary to criticise Israel’s response to the “horrendous” Hamas attack.
Deb Leonard, an independent candidate for Monash, took to Facebook on Monday to highlight that the attack “then sparked a mass annihilation of innocent Palestinian people”.
“The UN has openly stated that Israel is breaching human rights and international law in its response to the attack,” Ms Leonard wrote.
“I am ashamed that our government is not doing more to speak up against this genocide, and even more that the Coalition supports Israel in its ‘right to defend itself’.
“The attack on Israel on 7 Oct by Hamas was tragic, and caused much pain and suffering to the Jewish community.
“But the UN and international bodies consider Netenyahu’s actions to have gone way past what is needed to ‘defend itself’. The loss of innocent lives has to stop”.
Opposition home affairs spokesman James Paterson said if Climate 200 backed Teal candidates cannot restrain themselves from “insensitively vilifying Israel on the 7th of October they should just keep their thoughts to themselves”.
“Deb Leonard’s tokenistic denunciation of Hamas before moving on to the real purpose of viciously attacking the Jewish state is very revealing,” the Victorian Liberal Senator said.
“She clearly has no real desire to empathise with Australia’s Jewish community who are in mourning for the greatest loss of Jewish life since the Holocaust.”
Ms Leonard, who owns a law firm, was endorsed by the Voices for Monash in late July.
Ms Leonard rejected the assertion that she was being insensitive or “tokenistically denouncing anything”, instead claiming Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had breached human rights law.
“I empathise with all people affected by the horrific situation in Gaza and wish that more was being done to bring about a peaceful two-state solution,” she said.
Shorten urges Allan to consider protest permits
Bill Shorten has urged the Allan government to rethink its opposition to a protest permit system.
Premier Jacinta Allan last week resisted calls for a NSW-style permit system in response to October 7 rallies, saying police had the powers, tools and resources they needed to protect community safety.
But the Maribyrnong MP said there was “some merit in considering” the idea, adding “great cities of the world” have them and it didn’t stop people from protesting.
“It is working well in NSW, and perhaps it is time for Victoria to consider a permit system,” Mr Shorten told Sunrise.
“It doesn’t stop people protesting, but the purpose of it is looked at, the circumstances, how it’s done is taken before a Supreme Court.
“I don’t necessarily think it should apply to industrial relations, but for some of these protests we’ve seen week in, week out, I do think that having a permit system would at least straighten it up.”
Victoria Police’s pleas for a new permit system for protests were also shut down earlier this year by Ms Allan.
This is despite concerns about the growing number of violent rallies and the disruption they cause to the public and police resources.
The Australian Human Rights Law Centre has long opposed a permit system, warning it would potentially conflict with the right to freedom of expression and the right to peaceful assembly and association under Victoria’s charter of human rights.
Protests will go ahead in NSW today, after police and organisers reached an agreement permitting a rally before a Supreme Court decision was reached late last week.
Howard says October 7 time to show leadership
Former prime minister John Howard has taken aim at the Albanese government for failing to convey that Australia’s Jewish community “remains a treasured part of our nation” following the Hamas October 7 attack.
The Liberal stalwart declared the one-year anniversary of the terrible event was “a time to condemn the failure of the Prime Minister to show leadership on this issue”.
“The Hamas attack on Israel, a year ago today, was the greatest atrocity inflicted on the Jewish people since the Holocaust,” Mr Howard said.
“Notwithstanding the continued failure of the Albanese government, by its words and its deeds, to reflect this, Australia’s Jewish community should know that it remains a treasured part of our nation.
“It is a time to strengthen our opposition to anti-Semitism and further extend the hand of Australian mateship to Jewish Australians among us.”
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