Long-forgotten comments spark concern for Anthony Albanese
He has been quiet since gaining the Labor leadership, but for years Anthony Albanese was a vigorous critic of Israel, the Middle East’s most robust democracy.
A year before Anthony Albanese’s elevation to the Labor leadership, he lashed out at Israel, claiming it had acted disproportionately when defending its citizens from attacks from Gaza. He demanded the Coalition government explain why it voted against a UN move to launch an investigation into Israel’s “indiscriminate use of force” against Palestinians.
Neither Australia nor the US supported the politically motivated investigation by the discredited UN Human Rights Council. Nor did then Labor leader Bill Shorten.
This was simply the latest inquiry from a UN body that is routinely condemned for its obsession with the Jewish state as it turns a blind eye to human rights atrocities in China, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Afghanistan and Russia.
But Albanese spoke provocatively about the need for an inquiry in comments that broke with Australia’s bipartisan position of supporting Israel in one-sided international forums.
He has said he strongly supports Israel’s right to exist, objects to anti-semitism and opposes the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement.
But the Australian has unearthed stridently anti-Israel rhetoric and pro-Palestinian advocacy from Albanese spanning almost two decades, culminating in 2018, before a pause that came ahead of the 2019 federal election and his ascendancy to Labor leadership.
Former Labor prime ministers Shorten and Julia Gillard were staunch allies of Israel but, for the first time, pending the outcome of the election on Saturday, Australia could have a leader in Albanese with a record of attacking the only robust democracy in the Middle East.
Over the course of his career, Albanese has compared Israel’s government to Saddam Hussein’s murderous regime and backed investigations into Israel’s use of force. In one emotive parliamentary speech, Albanese even spoke of a Palestinian boy who aspired to martyrdom – or terrorism – sympathising with his situation that the conditions in Gaza were so distressing the 12-year-old felt he had “nothing to lose”.
The revelations of Albanese’s long-forgotten comments have sparked concerns an incoming federal Labor government could overhaul Australia’s foreign policy on the Middle East and move to recognise a State of Palestine – and that it would do so before any negotiated agreement and without declarations from Palestinian authorities that it would refrain from terror attacks and acknowledge Israel’s right to exist.
A shift in foreign policy toward Israel could also mean Labor walks away from the firm position held by the US and Australia to reject biased and politically motivated UN probes into Israel’s right to defend itself.
At the time of the 2018 UN vote, then foreign minister Julie Bishop said the resolution prejudged the outcome of any inquiry and ignored the role of terrorist group Hamas in inciting violent protests.
Yet Albanese disagreed, telling the ABC he supported an inquiry into the deaths of Palestinians at the hands of Israeli forces after violent protests in Gaza.
“No doubt there has been provocation in Gaza, but international law requires a proportionate response and those people who have guns on one side and on the other side has rocks, the people with guns have a responsibility to act in a way that is proportionate and . . . . I think that the government needs to explain why it has opposed this independent investigation,” he said.
Albanese also incorrectly claimed that Israel’s ongoing expansion of settlements in Gaza undermined a two-state solution. But Israel withdrew every soldier and settler from Gaza in 2005.
Albanese is partly responsible for setting up the Parliamentary Friends of Palestine group and, in June 2017, he hosted a “policy forum on Palestine” alongside Israel’s fiercest critics in the Labor Party, Tony Burke and former foreign minister Bob Carr.
Albanese has met at least four times with former British Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, whose extreme and unbalanced criticism of Israel and tolerance of anti-Semitism within his party sparked a reckoning in Britain and played a role in Labour’s defeat at the last UK election.
In 2015, Albanese spoke in Parliament about visiting the Palestinian territories of Ramallah and Gaza – accusing Israel of oppressing Palestinians, infusing his comments with underhand criticism of Israel’s policy of compulsory military service for its young people.
Albanese remarked that he “looked at the humiliation which Palestinians were forced to undergo in queuing to try to get across to get work each and every day, and the ongoing extreme poverty and lack of rights that people were subjected to, and also the lack of rights for the Israelis when you saw very young people with guns bigger than they were standing on corners in Jerusalem …”
Albanese’s contentious remarks about Australia’s strongest ally in the Middle East stretch over his career.
In a provocative parliamentary speech in 2003, Albanese compared Israel to the barbaric Baath party to argue the Coalition forces should not invade Iraq.
“We have heard a lot about the evils of Saddam Hussein. There is no doubt that it is correct that he is an evil tyrant who has oppressed his own people,” he said on March 20, 2003.
“But in the Gaza Strip this week, six Palestinians in a refugee camp were killed by the Israeli army, including a toddler shot in the head.
“What is the government saying about that? What is our government saying about the death of an American peace activist, 23-year-old Rachel Corrie, crushed by an Israeli army bulldozer? Ariel Sharon has already ruled out any so-called ‘road map for Middle East peace’ proposed by the Americans. He has declared that Israel will continue its occupation of Palestine in defiance of UN resolutions. What is the government saying about that?”
In 2000, Albanese spoke in Parliament about a young Palestinian resorting to martyrdom – or terrorism – presenting him as a victim rather than the innocent citizens who could be killed by his actions.
He also failed to apportion blame to the Palestinians’ hatred for Israel; many young Palestinians are indoctrinated with anti-Semitism at an early age.
“I have visited the beach camp in Gaza and was distressed at the conditions in which families were living. These conditions have led many young Palestinians to believe that they have nothing to lose. Today’s Sydney Morning Herald quotes a 12-year-old Palestinian boy, Muhammad Rayyan: ‘I wait for God to choose me,’ said the boy, who has been nicknamed the Lion because of his fearlessness. ‘When I see another fall, I am jealous. I long to be like him. This is my only goal in life’.”
In this speech, he claimed, with no evidence, that Israel had deliberately killed an innocent boy.
He called for Israel to return land to the Palestinians, saying: “The Palestinians must be given their homeland. The occupation of Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem by the Israelis has created generations of oppressed people.”
And he described Sharon, who would become Israel’s prime minister the next year, as an “extremist” who starts and prolongs wars.
Two years later, in September 2002, Albanese attacked the Israeli Defence Force’s methods for defending itself: “Suicide bombings are horrific but, as the UN Secretary-General has put it, self defence is not a blank cheque, and responding to terrorism does not in any way free Israel from its obligations under international law, nor does it justify creating a human rights and humanitarian crisis in Palestine.”
“The IDF routinely uses tanks, Apache helicopter gunships and F16 fighter jets against a population that has no military whatsoever and none of the protective institutions of a modern state.”
In the same speech, Albanese also blamed Sharon for starting the intifada and accused Israel of using excessive force.
In fact a militia unit of the Lebanese forces led by an extremist Lebanese Maronite Christian Elie Hobeika was responsible for the massacre. “The latest escalation of the conflict, the Al Aqsa intifada, began with Ariel Sharon’s provocative visit to the Haram al Sharif,” he said.
Most Middle East experts say then-PLO leader Yasser Arafat had decided on the intifada, irrespective of whether Sharon visited the Haram al Sharif, where he had been before.
This visit was reportedly co-ordinated by Palestinian security officials and was simply used as a pretext by Arafat.
Albanese also accused Israel of exploiting Palestinians for cheap labour.
“While many Israelis continue to demonise all Palestinians as terrorists, Palestinians experience Israelis as occupiers and employers of cheap labour, interrogators and jailers,” he said.
Palestinian violence is increasing in Israel – 14 people have been killed in attacks since March – and Australia’s former ambassador to Israel, Liberal member for Wentworth Dave Sharma, said Albanese’s views were “very troubling”.
“They’re obviously quite strongly held and consistently expressed beliefs of Albanese that all of the fault in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict lies only with one side,” he said.
“He continuously describes Israel as the aggressor nation and he continually adopts the Palestinian national narrative about where the fault is in this conflict.”
Sharma, who dealt with both sides of politics as Australia’s top diplomat in Israel, said Albanese’s public comments could indicate there would be a shift in foreign policy.
“First of all you could see, and he’s already made this very clear in his interview from 2018, the cessation of Australian support for Israel in international forums. He made it quite clear he would no longer be a supporter of Israel against the UN and its investigative machinery,” Sharma said.
The biggest foreign policy change Sharma predicts that could occur under a Labor government is recognition of a state of Palestine before any agresement had been reached between Israel and the Palestinians – and without any declarations to not engage in terrorism.
He said this would “impose an Australian view of the solution to the conflict upon the people and unilaterally recognise the state of Palestine even if the Palestinians have not forsworn terror, even if the Palestinians do not accept Israel’s right to exist, even if the Palestinians are not prepared to respect international borders.
“That would be a gross departure from traditional Australian foreign policy but also from those of our allies like the US, the UK, most countries in Europe,” he said.
The Liberal Party’s policy platform states that a re-elected Coalition government “will continue to stand against one-sided and provocative resolutions in the UN and elsewhere that aim to unfairly target Israel, or challenge its right to exist”.
Labor recognised the state of Palestine at its national platform for the first time in March last year, stifling debate from dissenters.
Foreign spokeswoman Penny Wong moved the amendment that calls for the Palestinian statehood to be “an important priority” for the next Labor government.
In response to questions from The Australian, a Labor campaign spokeswoman said the resolution was “non-binding and recognises this is a decision for a future Labor government”.
“An Albanese Labor government will ensure that our approach to the region contributes to a peaceful resolution of the conflict and to progress towards a two-state solution,” she said.
“Labor will continue to call on both sides of the conflict to refrain from any actions that hamper peaceful outcomes for both the Israeli and Palestinian peoples.”
Former Labor chairman of the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee, Michael Danby, said he doubted a Labor government would “say anything about the UN’s obsessions with Israel”.
“Over 30 years, Palestinians rejected three peace conferences, failed to hold an election in 20 years, they are divided between Hamas and the Palestinian Authority, and all remain committed to Israel’s elimination,” he said.
“ALP Middle East policy would be a distraction of Australia’s foreign policy, as most Arab states are committed to peace via the Abraham Accords.”
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