Activists protested in front of Liberal Senator Jonno Duniam’s office on July 25 against his and his party’s support for Israel’s genocide in Gaza. They also criticised Labor’s complicity in this war crime.
Duniam has made it clear he supports Israel, supporting foreign minister Penny Wong’s October 2023 motion that stated that “to seek to draw some equivalence between acts of terror by Hamas with acts of defence of Israel is wrong. There is no comparison.”
During the University of Melbourne’s student encampment protest in May last year, Duniam, a senior fellow at the conservative Menzies Research Centre, condemned former Labor Senator Fatima Payman, who said Israel is perpetrating genocide. He also described the peaceful student protests as “indoctrination”.
However, polls show Israel is losing support. An Essential poll on July 30 found 41% of Australians think Israel should “permanently withdraw” its military action in Gaza.
This is prompting Western governments to mostly change their messaging, rather than commit to action against Israel. At least 28 countries, including Britain, France, Canada, Italy, New Zealand, Japan and Australia issued a joint declaration, on July 21, calling for “an immediate ceasefire and a political pathway to security and peace for Israelis, Palestinians and the entire region”.
They “strongly oppose” steps towards territorial or demographic change in the Occupied Palestinian Territories and condemned Israel’s “resettlement plan”, which allows settlement building across the West Bank, including East Jerusalem.
Protesters outside Duniam’s office said the entire Gazan population is at risk of starvation and, with 90% of the territory destroyed, it is clear that Israel is not involved in a war of “self-defence”.
Further, it is possible that United States airstrikes on Iran were coordinated from the joint US-Australian Pine Gap military base. It has also been confirmed that, as of June last year, there are at least 66 active defence export permits to Israel, despite Labor saying Australia does not trade in weapons or parts with Israel.
The list of exports to Israel after October 7, acquired under FOI by Declassified Australia, is 90 pages long. Officials insist these permits are for “non-lethal equipment” or “repairs” to Australian-owned systems. But many of the same companies are a part of global supply chains providing components to Israeli weapons systems, including drones and fighter jets. The government focus on “non-lethal” components is a vain attempt to deflect criticism.
The International Criminal Court’s ongoing investigation and the International Court of Justice’s (ICJ) provisional measures acknowledge that Israel is plausibly committing genocide. This means that those states which continue to trade weapons or parts with Israel are themselves breaching international humanitarian law.
Australia has not only continued its trade, but it has increased exports to Israel by approximately 20% over a 12-month period. This directly contravenes the ICJ’s provisional measures in January last year.
Declassified Australia reported that Australian Bureau of Statistics export data shows that, last year, Australian exports to Israel totalled about $212 million, up from about $177 million the year before — a rise of roughly 20%.
These exports are contributions to state committing a genocide. By continuing to grant export permits to Elbit Systems or Rafael Advanced Defense Systems, directly or through supply chains, Labor becomes an enabler of collective punishment, ethnic cleansing and systemic war crimes.
This is why activists protested outside Duniam’s office. While Labor insists it supports an immediate ceasefire and humanitarian relief, it claims its “middle power” status means it can only do so much. That is an excuse for not taking action. We need sanctions, not “strong words” and an end to the two-way arms trade.
[Get involved in the Tasmanian Palestine Advocacy Network.]
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