Greens slammed for ‘double standards’ over failure to call out support for Iran at protests

A peak Jewish lobby group has raised alarm over the attendance of federal Greens’ MPs at pro-­Palestinian rallies where protesters held placards declaring ‘Iran has the right to defend itself’.

Greens MP Max Chandler-Mather. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Martin Ollman

A peak Jewish lobby group has raised alarm over the attendance of federal Greens’ MPs at pro-­Palestinian rallies where protesters held placards declaring “Iran has the right to defend itself”.

The Executive Council of Australian Jewry said the implications of the Greens’ attendance at such events – and the absence of calling out Iran at those events – were extremely serious.

Greens MP for Griffith Max Chandler-Mather spoke at a rally in Brisbane this week where he said Israel was carrying out “a manufactured and engineered famine” and “genocide in Gaza”.

He did not mention Iran or discuss the ­escalation in tension following its launch of missiles and drones into the Jewish state at the weekend, ending his address by calling for Australia to stop sending materials that were used to build Israeli weapons and planes.

Rally attendees carried signs declaring “Iran has the right to defend itself”.

“If the implications were not so serious, there would be something comical about the so-called ‘progressive’ Greens aligning themselves with the brutal clerical establishment in Iran, which executes people for being gay, and murders young women for the way they wear their clothes,” ECAJ chief executive Peter Wertheim said.

“Two days after the Iranian regime directed more than 300 drones and missiles at Israel, Greens MP Max Chandler-Mather called for Israel to be deprived of weapons to defend itself, and was completely silent about the Iranian attack.”

Greens foreign affairs spokesman Jordon Steele-John said his party had “been the strongest voice in the parliament advocating for action to support human rights in the face of the Iranian ­regime’s brutal repression of its people”.

This advocacy includes calling for stronger implementation of Magnitsky-style sanctions on ­Iranian officials and the designation of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps as a terrorist organisation, he said.

“Iran’s military strike on Israel over the weekend should be condemned as a reckless escalation, as should Israel’s bombing of Iran’s consulate in Syria,” Senator Steele-John said. “This escalation does nothing to help the millions of Palestine suffering from the state of Israel’s genocide in Gaza.

“The global community, including the Australian government, should be working diplomatically to de-escalate tensions in the region.”

Senator Steele-John said the Greens would continue to attend community protests across the country calling for an end to the genocide in Gaza, the end of ­Australian weapons exports to ­Israel, an end to the illegal occupation of Palestine and a just and lasting peace for Palestinians and Israelis.