I join other members in this place in speaking about this issue. I come to it from a place of extreme distress and heartbreak in witnessing what we saw over the last month in Israel, in Gaza and in the West Bank. We all are joined in hoping that that cycle of violence is brought to an end.
Full speech
Mr BURNS (Macnamara) (11:02): ‘We can continue to fight. We can continue to kill—and continue to be killed. But we can also try to put a stop to this never-ending cycle of blood. We can also give peace a chance.’ Those were the words spoken by the Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin after signing the Oslo Accords 26 years ago. It was a time filled with hope, optimism and potential, and, of course, it was a time that was unforgivably ripped apart by a Jewish extremist who shot and killed the Israeli Prime Minister. His assassination essentially tore up those prospects for peace.
I join other members in this place in speaking about this issue. I come to it from a place of extreme distress and heartbreak in witnessing what we saw over the last month in Israel, in Gaza and in the West Bank. We all are joined in hoping that that cycle of violence is brought to an end.
I do have to say that I think one of the key issues that confront this region and the Israelis and the Palestinians is trust. The Israelis are, quite rightly, nervous about what sort of response they will get from Hamas, who have launched over 4,000 rockets into civilian areas, and the Palestinian people, quite rightly, have trust issues because they have had restrictions on movements, on their living standards and on their ability to travel and work in different parts. We need to see an end to that as well. Trust takes a long time to build and it takes a very short time to be taken away. I really want to see more trust being built, slowly but surely, by both sides. Without it, there will never ever be peace, there will never ever be an opportunity for peace and there will never ever be a chance to end this devastating cycle of violence.
I want to take this opportunity to send my condolences to all of the victims of the violence, especially the too many children who were killed in this conflict, especially in Gaza. Of course, we also send our condolences to the children in Israel who were caught up in this violence, as well as to the two Thai workers and the Indian national who was working in the Israeli city of Ashkelon when a rocket landed on their factory, killing her.
I also need to take this opportunity to say that I think it’s unfair of Australians to assume they understand all of the complexities of this conflict. It’s unfair of Australians to assume that we get what life is like from the perspective of either a young Palestinian person or an Israeli person. We don’t. We don’t understand the complexities, we don’t understand the history, and for us to cast judgement automatically is problematic in the first place. I believe it is our role, as a country, to support efforts to build trust and cooperation between these two people.
I have witnessed a pretty dark side in Australia over the last month. The Jewish community in Australia has been on the receiving end of a barrage of pretty aggressive and ugly behaviour by many people in the Australian community, as if it is somehow responsible for the actions or the outcomes of the conflict on the other side of the world. I want to say here, clearly and unequivocally, that if you are making a statement about the conflict in the Middle East but you’re making it to a Jewish person or a Jewish business in Australia then that is no longer a comment about the Middle East. You are making an anti-Semitic statement, and it is unacceptable to take out your anger and frustration about this conflict against Jewish people around the world. We’ve seen it in New York and in Europe, and, of course, in Melbourne as well, where people and businesses have been vandalised, so I have to call that out.
I finish by saying that I still have hope. I still dream of the Israelis and the Palestinians one day living side by side in two states, full of peace, full of hope and full of trust.
The DEPUTY SPEAKER ( Dr Gillespie ): There being no further speakers, the debate is adjourned and the resumption of the debate will be made an order of the day for the next sitting.