Looking to the future as historic ties are celebrated

Day one of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s historic visit to Australia reinforced the strength of a resolute relationship that pre-dates Israel’s foundation. The visit marks 100 years of friendship, dating back to October 1917 when the Australian Light Horse Brigade, in the “last successful cavalry charge in history’’, as Mr Netanyahu said, valiantly liberated the strategic town of Beersheba from Ottoman rule. He also acknowledged “we would not be here’’ without the “tremendous courage of the Australian troops in World War II preventing the invasion of the eastern part of the Middle East by Rommel’s forces’’. Decades on, in the Gulf War, data from Australian satellites about incoming missiles also “saved a lot of Israeli lives’’.

The relationship, solidified 70 years ago when Australia became the first country to vote for the recognition of the state of Israel at the UN, is built on shared values — democracy, a desire for peace and security, the active participation of women in all facets of society and a shared passion for technological and economic progress.

In an eloquent speech yesterday, Malcolm Turnbull described Australia as an “all weather friend’’ of Israel. Our defence personnel serving in peacekeeping missions along three of Israel’s borders, as he said, were evidence of our “tangible and resolute’’ commitment to Israeli security. Both nations, as the Prime Minister wrote in these pages yesterday, share “the rich cultural inheritance of the Bible, its stories and values, a foundation and a context for our history, our literature, our imagination. And we could not imagine modern Australia, the most successful multicultural society in the world, without the brilliance and the enterprise of our almost 120,000-strong Jewish-Australian community’’. Israel was also the “ultimate start-up state’’, he said. Its brilliance and innovation will be writ large when Mr Turnbull visits Beersheba, now the cyber capital of Israel, to mark the centenary of the charge of the Light Horse. Agreements on technology and cyber security to be signed on the current visit should benefit both nations.

Controversial calls by former Labor prime ministers Bob Hawke (a long-time staunch supporter of Israel) and Kevin Rudd and former foreign ministers Bob Carr and Gareth Evans for the recognition of a Palestinian state underline deepening divisions in Labor ranks over the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The Australian, conscious that in 1947 the UN voted for the creation of a Jewish state alongside an Arab state in what was then the British mandate of Palestine, supports a negotiated two-state solution, as we have for decades. Bill Shorten is right in endorsing the idea of Dreamliner flights from Australia to Tel Aviv. But as Labor walks away from decades of bipartisanship, it would make a bad error in caving in to Palestinian efforts to achieve statehood through the back door, without a negotiated agreement to determine borders and other issues.

Yesterday, Mr Netanyahu was highly effective in rebutting calls for the unilateral recognition of Palestine as a state. He put a simple question to Mr Hawke and Mr Rudd: what kind of state it would be? “A state which calls for Israel’s destruction? A state whose territories will be used for radical Islam?’’ When Israel retreated from Gaza, he said, it “took out all the settlements there, gave the territory to the Palestinian Authority’’. Gaza, he said, became “a terrorist state of Hamas, backed by Iran. They fired thousands and thousands of missiles against us. So clearly when people say they are ‘for’ a Palestinian state, they are not for that kind of state.’’

In the realpolitk of the Middle East, “if Israel does not ensure the security (of Palestine) then that state will become another bastion of radical Islam. We have to make sure the Palestinians recognise the Jewish state, and we have to ensure Israel has responsibility for security over all the territories.” Mr Netanyahu does not want to incorporate two million Palestinians as Israeli citizens or subject them to Israeli rule. He wants them, he said, “to have all the freedoms to govern themselves but none of the powers to threaten us’’. But Palestinian intransigence in refusing to recognise a Jewish state in any shape or form is the heart of the conflict.

Mr Turnbull is right in vowing never to support “one-sided resolutions” at the UN that demand an end to Israeli settlement building on occupied land, such as that approved by the Security Council in December after Barack Obama broke with tradition and failed to exercise the US’s right of veto. Israel is understandably preoccupied with the increasing militancy of Iran, which tested a ballistic missile last month. A day ago, its Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, called for Palestinians to launch another intifada against Israel and its government, which he described as a “cancerous tumour’’.

A push for Palestinians to be more flexible in negotiating with Israel could come from an unexpected quarter, however — more moderate Arab nations. They are also facing what Mr Netanyahu described as “malignant forces … radical forces that seek to take all of humanity back to a dark age”. As he said last night in a Sydney synagogue, Israel would be seen as a “beacon of light” in the darkness as “many Arab countries realise Israel is not their enemy but their valuable ally in fighting off the barbarism that surrounds all of us’’. Conscious of Israel’s defences and effective intelligence, nations such as Jordan, Kuwait and the Gulf states increasingly see Israel as a bulwark against Islamic State and other extremists. Despite invasion, conflicts and lack of natural resources, Israel, the only liberal democracy in its region, is a world leader in science and technology. It is reaching out to the world, bolstering economic ties in Asia and Europe. Palestinians, in their own interests and those of world peace, should be pragmatic, put blind hatred aside and negotiate in good faith, recognising Israel as the nation state and ancestral homeland of the Jewish people.