Australia’s Arts Minister Tony Burke was right when he rebuked Netanyahu: “Strength is not measured by how many people you can blow up or how many children you can leave hungry.”
His words pierced through Israel’s propaganda machine. And Prime Minister Anthony Albanese himself has also condemned Israel’s “indiscriminate killing of civilians” in Gaza.
But words without action are complicity.
While Australia criticizes Israel on moral grounds, its economic and military ties are tightening. In the year leading up to March 2025, Australian exports to Israel surged by 20%, reaching US $246 million. Imports jumped to US $578 million.
Even worse: at least 35 military export permits remain active—licenses approved before October 2023 that still allow the transfer of military items while Israel wages a genocidal war on Gaza’s children.
This is where Albanese’s legacy is on the line. When many had lost hope of Julian Assange ever being freed, he defied expectations and fought for his release. That showed courage. That showed moral leadership.
Now he must show it again.
Australia cannot condemn genocide while fueling it. Albanese has the power and the responsibility to leverage trade and military ties to sanction Israel.
So we are clear, that means:
Revoking active military export permits to Israel immediately.
Suspending all defense cooperation until Israel ends its crimes.
Restricting trade in dual-use technologies that enable surveillance, occupation, and repression.
Pushing for war crimes investigations at the ICC with the same determination shown for Assange.
And there is a deeper reckoning too. Australia’s own history is stained with the genocide of Indigenous peoples. To atone, Australia must not only confront its past but act now to stop Israeli genocide in Gaza. Real solidarity means learning from history, not repeating it.
Australia’s Words of Outrage Can’t Hide Its Complicity in Israel’s Genocide
Australia’s Arts Minister Tony Burke was right when he rebuked Netanyahu: “Strength is not measured by how many people you can blow up or how many children you can leave hungry.”
Under the Genocide Convention, Australia has a legal obligation, not just a moral one, to prevent genocide wherever it occurs. That means stopping the flow of weapons, money, and trade to a regime carrying it out.
If Australia chooses trade over humanity, permits over principle, then it is not just an accomplice in Israel’s crimes, it is in breach of international law. And history will remember it not as a bystander, but as an enabler.
Btw the face of 2 white men with makeup and styled hair in front of that flag is sickening. … which is probably the point.
Ahmed saying clearly what we are constantly calling for here in the colony. Great work Ahmed … this is exactly the message Albanese and Burke need to hear in response to their inactions.