Speaker 1: From The Australian. Here's what's on the front. I'm Claire Harvey.
Speaker 1: It's Friday, December nineteen, twenty twenty five. Anthony Albanezi is
Speaker 1: pivoting hard to deal with the problem of anti Semitism.
Speaker 1: After an exhausting week in which we've all felt what
Speaker 1: Nicholas Jensen calls a continental shelf of rage and grief,
Speaker 1: the federal government will legislate a crackdown on anti Semitism
Speaker 1: and hate preachers from universities to border force.
Speaker 2: Today.
Speaker 1: Yonnie Bachan and Nicholas Jensen join me to debate how
Speaker 1: things will play out from here. For this episode, I
Speaker 1: was joined in the studio by two of the Australians
Speaker 1: most thoughtful people, opinion editor Nicholas Jensen and senior journalist
Speaker 1: Yonnie Bashan. The first voice you'll hear is Nicholas.
Speaker 3: Everything still feels very raw and I think the emotion
Speaker 3: is kind of ratcheting up.
Speaker 4: What's been both your reads. I suppose that the last
Speaker 4: twenty four.
Speaker 5: Hours disappointment after disappointment after disappointment until today, I felt
Speaker 5: that the Prime Minister's announcements today and the government's announcement
Speaker 5: on what they were going to do were welcome, overdue
Speaker 5: and still clearly in development. They're clearly scrambling for answers
Speaker 5: to this. But I think these are solutions that should
Speaker 5: have been supplied months ago. I don't know why he
Speaker 5: had to wait another four days to announce them, but
Speaker 5: here we are.
Speaker 4: Yeah, overdue. I think a lot of people are thinking that.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I think the Prime Minister's attitude from the beginning of
Speaker 1: this crisis has been shock and horror, like so many
Speaker 1: of us felt initially. But then I think he went
Speaker 1: very quickly and probably too quickly, towards But isn't Australia great.
Speaker 1: Isn't it wonderful that brave people stepped up and more
Speaker 1: lives were not lost. Then he started talking about gun
Speaker 1: law reform, and that's where I think he completely misread
Speaker 1: the mood. So it is only on Thursday, four days
Speaker 1: after the crisis, that the government, the Commonwealth Government, has
Speaker 1: begun talking seriously about recalling Parliament and indicated that they're
Speaker 1: now working on hate speech laws, cracking down on anti
Speaker 1: Semitism in terms of language and acts, new visa rules,
Speaker 1: and dealing with the hate preachers who have helped create
Speaker 1: so much of this environment.
Speaker 3: Yesterday I looked at the transcripts of some of the
Speaker 3: interviews he did doing the media rounds, and when he
Speaker 3: got up today at Parliament, he was reproducing a lot
Speaker 3: of those stock lines that he has about what the
Speaker 3: government's doing.
Speaker 4: And you do get the sense that he's.
Speaker 3: Kind of almost like an earnest bank clerk, is running
Speaker 3: through a.
Speaker 4: Checklist that he's satisfied that he's got right.
Speaker 3: But my sense is that he's not tapping into the
Speaker 3: mood or tapping into an emotional register that people want
Speaker 3: from their national leader. There's this continental shelf of rage
Speaker 3: and grief, and people want that reflected, I think in
Speaker 3: their leader.
Speaker 2: Well, I think the.
Speaker 5: Other grave misstep that I think he and other ministers
Speaker 5: have made is defending their record on this for the
Speaker 5: last four days, saying well, we've done more than any
Speaker 5: other government has done, and we've done this, we've done this,
Speaker 5: and we've thrown money at this and that, and then
Speaker 5: a few days later saying well, we clearly haven't done enough,
Speaker 5: and now we're going to scramble in, pull all these
Speaker 5: other resources together and enact all of the solutions that
Speaker 5: you've been asking for for months. I think that just
Speaker 5: betrays a leader and a government that is in a
Speaker 5: tactical war to try and bet this down, rather than
Speaker 5: a government that actually sees and diagnoses a problem and
Speaker 5: tries to fix it. I mean, if I had to
Speaker 5: use a word to describe the government over the past
Speaker 5: few days, it's that it's misdiagnosed the problem the entire time.
Speaker 5: I mean, what was the first thing that Anthony Albinizi did.
Speaker 5: He started looking at gun law reform. That's great, but
Speaker 5: that's scratching at the age. It's the root course of
Speaker 5: the problem is this anti semitism issue. And for whatever reason,
Speaker 5: and we all have our theories on it, the government's
Speaker 5: just been in and dial about how to handle this.
Speaker 1: It was only on Thursday that the Prime Minister admitted
Speaker 1: that he's done things wrong. He hasn't done things perfectly
Speaker 1: since October seventeen, twenty three, and the change in tone
Speaker 1: in twenty four hours is remarkable and I think I'd.
Speaker 2: Love to know what you guys think.
Speaker 1: There can be no denying that this is because Josh
Speaker 1: Frodenberg went down to Bondi Beach and made a speech
Speaker 1: that hit all the notes that the Prime Minister has
Speaker 1: failed to hit in the past few days. It was raw,
Speaker 1: it was angry, it was emotional, and it's set out
Speaker 1: very logically the intellectual progression from antisemitism as an idea
Speaker 1: to violent action.
Speaker 5: I almost feel in my cynical heart of hearts that
Speaker 5: talking more about ISIS and magnifying the role of ISIS
Speaker 5: in this provides an escape patch for the Prime Minister
Speaker 5: not to talk as much about anti Semitism, because Isis, yes,
Speaker 5: is anti Semitic, but ISIS is actually just she had
Speaker 5: us an anti Western and I worry that that has
Speaker 5: been strategic and possibly tactical in its deployment outwardly. What
Speaker 5: this government has done is push Israel away further than
Speaker 5: any other Australian government has done in generations. And that
Speaker 5: would suggest that Anthony Albinezi, which is talking about him,
Speaker 5: just doesn't like Israel very much. And he was also,
Speaker 5: i believe, the convenor of Labor Friends of Palestine several
Speaker 5: decades ago.
Speaker 1: That's right, This is student politics kind of for grown ups,
Speaker 1: isn't it. You know they were both labor from their
Speaker 1: adolescence and labor left, and one of the shibbiliths of
Speaker 1: the labor left is that Israel is a colonizing state
Speaker 1: and is illegitimate. Free Palestine is kind of what they
Speaker 1: bang on about at Young Labor meetings on university campuses.
Speaker 1: The difference in October seven, twenty twenty three is that
Speaker 1: that idea then spilled into the mainstream and became a
Speaker 1: thing on social media that Abby Chatfield was talking about.
Speaker 1: But why then, when most are the kind of sensible
Speaker 1: adults who are on that progression that you have from
Speaker 1: uni leftism to sensible center, why were they not able
Speaker 1: to go with the grown ups.
Speaker 3: It's often said that since he's been PM that he
Speaker 3: is trying to find a more consensual position and more
Speaker 3: centrist position. I should say that appeals to a broad
Speaker 3: Australian electorate and not be too politically left or so on.
Speaker 3: But I suppose when it comes to issues like Israel
Speaker 3: and other things too, you do wonder whether the old
Speaker 3: activism is just below the surface.
Speaker 5: My take on it is they don't hate Israel. Yeah,
Speaker 5: they like Israel. I don't know why Anthony Albanezi hasn't
Speaker 5: just gone to Israel. That really amuses me. I'm still
Speaker 5: confused as to why Penny One went to Israel and
Speaker 5: didn't go to the southern villages. That just makes no
Speaker 5: sense to me. I don't believe that these people despise
Speaker 5: or dislike Israel, and they definitely don't feel that way
Speaker 5: about Jeus.
Speaker 4: I think they like Jews.
Speaker 5: I don't think there's any reason for them not to.
Speaker 5: I just think they're political animals and they want to
Speaker 5: win elections, and I think that's what this is about.
Speaker 5: At the end of the day.
Speaker 1: One of the saddest things that's unfolded in the past
Speaker 1: couple of days is seeing people being targeted for either
Speaker 1: being Jewish or for helping Jews. Mister Ahmed, the hero
Speaker 1: to back and as who crash tackled the shooter, has
Speaker 1: been criticized by people in his own Muslim community for
Speaker 1: helping Jews. Jewish businesses a smoke salmon bagel shop in Bondi,
Speaker 1: Various bakeries have been publicly targeted with one star reviews
Speaker 1: or zero star reviews just because they are Jewish. And
Speaker 1: you can see that there is a targeted campaigning going on.
Speaker 1: You told me earlier today about businesses you know who
Speaker 1: you feel are retreating from public Jewishness. Is that a
Speaker 1: new development because of the violence, or is it exhaustion
Speaker 1: from seeing no action being taken and resulting in this.
Speaker 5: I don't think we can discount the exhaustion, that's certainly true.
Speaker 5: But what I can tell you is that after October seven,
Speaker 5: and I'm talking about in the months after October seven,
Speaker 5: Jewish business has experienced a wave. For some it would
Speaker 5: have been a trickle one. For others it would have
Speaker 5: been a wave, but they would have received a lot
Speaker 5: of hate either of their eyes, you know, people spitting
Speaker 5: in front of their shop, or it would have happened
Speaker 5: online in the ways that you described. And I think
Speaker 5: the difference now is that whereas then the worst that
Speaker 5: could happen is words can never hurt me. It's you know,
Speaker 5: unlike sticks and stones. After an incident like we had
Speaker 5: to over the weekend, we know that this is much
Speaker 5: more real than any.
Speaker 2: Of us have dreamed.
Speaker 5: And so I think that's why people having second thoughts
Speaker 5: about how they want to express their identity publicly. I
Speaker 5: think that's one of the saddest parts about all this.
Speaker 1: The Prime Ministers now appointed David Gonski, who is proudly Jewish.
Speaker 1: He's a very senior Australian businessman. He's been Chancellor of
Speaker 1: the University of New South Wales for twenty years to
Speaker 1: lead a review and a forward looking report recommending how
Speaker 1: universities should handle antisemitism in the future.
Speaker 2: God, there's a lot to do in universities, isn't there.
Speaker 4: Nick, Yeah, there is. I know we've all spoken a
Speaker 4: lot about it.
Speaker 3: I suppose on the Gonski appointment, from what I've read
Speaker 3: and can see, is that he probably hasn't been at
Speaker 3: the spearhead of university leaders speaking very openly and vocally
Speaker 3: about this. Two weeks ago, Jennifer Westercott at Western Sydney
Speaker 3: University spoke out very very strongly about these things and
Speaker 3: actually was I think probably the only university leader that
Speaker 3: spoke in great detail about how students were being sanctioned
Speaker 3: and they were taking discipline reactions.
Speaker 4: So that's kind of my take.
Speaker 1: How does either Anthony Alberanezi or Josh Freedenberg persuade Australians
Speaker 1: that they're going to have to accept some limitations on
Speaker 1: free speech? For example, are we going to be allowed
Speaker 1: to chant globalize the interfata anymore? The UK has now
Speaker 1: banned that phrase and said that people will be arrested.
Speaker 5: And by the way, who else chances that phrase the
Speaker 5: Union movement Unions for Palestine will hold up science saying
Speaker 5: quite globalized, the anti fighter, but Unions for antifarter that's awkward.
Speaker 1: Yeah, we've already accepted the banning of Nazi symbols of
Speaker 1: the Heil Hitler gesture. Yeah, so now it's about persuasion
Speaker 1: for Albanize, isn't it?
Speaker 4: It is?
Speaker 3: But I think this problem exists right across the spectrum.
Speaker 3: I think there's also a massive reckoning here on the right.
Speaker 3: It's a massive reckoning among those that might identify themselves
Speaker 3: as say classical liberals or of a kind of right
Speaker 3: wing philosophy of that kind. And you know, I broadly
Speaker 3: associate myself with that, And I think that means that
Speaker 3: you have a very high bar for free speech, and
Speaker 3: that means you have people like David Irving allowed to
Speaker 3: come into Australia, you know, probably the world's most infamous
Speaker 3: Holocaust denio.
Speaker 1: Who has been banned over the past forty years from
Speaker 1: entering this country.
Speaker 3: Yes, and then also we had Candae Owens that recently
Speaker 3: got knocked back to some extent. The old classical liberal
Speaker 3: line essentially goes from the assumption of these people are
Speaker 3: provably wrong on their substantive points, their falsifiers of history,
Speaker 3: and what they are spouting is perversion. And I think
Speaker 3: in the past that position has kind of been okay
Speaker 3: because social media didn't really exist in the same way,
Speaker 3: and I think a lot of people could assume a consensus,
Speaker 3: mainstream opinion out there that would know these people are wrong.
Speaker 3: Now I do not think that exists, and I'm not
Speaker 3: coming here with answers to that, but I think this
Speaker 3: is part of the problem, is that everything is now
Speaker 3: so shattered.
Speaker 4: How do we stop what happened on Sunday?
Speaker 3: People are going to have to change, you know, maybe
Speaker 3: that some pretty fundamental things about what they believe.
Speaker 1: Coming up more of my conversation with Nick Jensen and
Speaker 1: Johnnie Bishann't.
Speaker 5: Can I ask you, Claire, you know one thing I'm seeing,
Speaker 5: and I know I'm echoing the views of a lot
Speaker 5: of people, is that we're seeing more conviction out of
Speaker 5: Chris Mins than we are out of the PM. And
Speaker 5: there are certainly some people out there who would be
Speaker 5: thinking to themselves, why isn't that guy our prime minister?
Speaker 4: This just for the week?
Speaker 5: What is it about men's that makes him different from
Speaker 5: Albanesi in terms of how he feels about this and
Speaker 5: why is he more believable and credible.
Speaker 2: He's phenomenally articulate. Mins.
Speaker 1: He's in the labor right as opposed to the labor left,
Speaker 1: so he doesn't have a position to defend in terms
Speaker 1: of Palestine. Josh Frodenberg was critical of Chris Mins though
Speaker 1: that was a moment for Mens. Frodenberg said, well, Premier,
Speaker 1: the marches over the harbor Ridge happened in you state.
Speaker 4: Yeah, he did try and stop him.
Speaker 1: Yes, but as Fredenberg said, he did try and stop it.
Speaker 1: The police went to the Supreme Court and got rejected.
Speaker 1: Frog said, will change the law. What have you thought
Speaker 1: as everyone says, wow, Christmas is amazing this week.
Speaker 4: Well, he just seems to.
Speaker 3: As we were talking before about the kind of emotional
Speaker 3: register or trying to trying to capture the mood of
Speaker 3: the public, he seems to do that in the way
Speaker 3: Albanezi just can't. And he speaks very fluently, and also
Speaker 3: before this crisis though whenever there were questions about anti
Speaker 3: Semitism and even other issues, he doesn't seem tightly managed.
Speaker 3: He seems like he's someone who's prepared to respond on instinct,
Speaker 3: and that serves him very very well.
Speaker 2: He never talks about the rules based global order, does he, or.
Speaker 4: Programmatic specificity or anything like that. But contrast that to Elbow.
Speaker 3: I mean the thing with Elbow to some extent is
Speaker 3: that he can reach that emotional register. Take, for instance,
Speaker 3: when the Pope died, it was very clear that he
Speaker 3: was deeply moved by that.
Speaker 1: He was very articulate too about the social media ban
Speaker 1: for under sixteens. He spoke about the grieving families who'd
Speaker 1: come to see him and begged him to take action,
Speaker 1: and he was doing it. You don't often get two
Speaker 1: opportunities in public life, Yanni. Do you think we will
Speaker 1: see him visit Israel in twenty twenty six.
Speaker 5: I think it would be prudent if he did. I
Speaker 5: don't think any harm would come if he didn't. I've
Speaker 5: always wondered, again Penny Wong, our foreign minister not going
Speaker 5: to the southern villages in Israel. I don't understand what
Speaker 5: political capital was gained or held by doing that. I
Speaker 5: saw only political capital being burned. I saw nothing good
Speaker 5: having come out of that. And I feel the same
Speaker 5: way about Anthony Albanezi. What is lost by visiting Israel.
Speaker 5: What is betrayed by visiting Israel? But what is given
Speaker 5: up by not going? Well everything, No one believes that
Speaker 5: you truly identify and connect with this issue if you
Speaker 5: can't go and shake hands with Bibi Netanyahu and visit
Speaker 5: the Southern the Southern village.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I see yourself. I know that that's important.
Speaker 3: But I would really like to see whether he might
Speaker 3: go down to the Great Synagogue. I'd really like to
Speaker 3: see what would happen here if he did that. Now,
Speaker 3: if he did that, now he went to.
Speaker 2: An interfaith service at the Catholic estrue.
Speaker 4: He did he did? Now?
Speaker 3: Actually, I think yesterday was kind of a big day,
Speaker 3: I reckon in the history of this country.
Speaker 4: Had a lot happened.
Speaker 3: You know, Friedenberg's down there delivering this huge speech that
Speaker 3: seems to be a landmark. We had this extraordinary moment
Speaker 3: on the steps of Saint Mary's at this interfaith service
Speaker 3: that you referred to, where the archbishop is chiding the
Speaker 3: Prime minister. I mean it's huge. It's like Daniel Mannix
Speaker 3: around the time of the referenda for World War One,
Speaker 3: criticizing our Billy Hughes say, it's a pretty extraordinary thing.
Speaker 2: Nick.
Speaker 5: In many years from now, we're going to be looking
Speaker 5: back on these events. You'll be recounting them to maybe
Speaker 5: your grandkids. Even what is the most striking memory of
Speaker 5: Sunday that you're going to be recounting to them.
Speaker 3: One image that I won't forget is of one of
Speaker 3: the gunmens seeming to water away are passers by as
Speaker 3: he was shooting into the crowd of Jews celebrating Haneker,
Speaker 3: as if to say, I'm not interested in killing you,
Speaker 3: I'm only interested in killing Jews.
Speaker 1: That's the moment that shows that this was connected to
Speaker 1: anti Semitism, right that.
Speaker 4: Yeah, can be no other can be no other response
Speaker 4: to that.
Speaker 1: I suppose I'll never forget people sprinting in terror from
Speaker 1: the sand at Bondai Beach.
Speaker 2: We've seen shark alarms before.
Speaker 1: We usually think the peril is in the water and
Speaker 1: we've all got the jaws them in our head when
Speaker 1: we go to the beach. We've seen people run out
Speaker 1: of the water in fear. I've never seen people run
Speaker 1: from the sand in fear at this place, which is
Speaker 1: you know, so deer all of our hearts as Australians.
Speaker 1: It's holidays, it's summer, it's Christmas and you know, Australians
Speaker 1: were terrified en mass for really one of the first
Speaker 1: times I've ever seen.
Speaker 5: I think I'll remember Ruven Morrison, one of the older
Speaker 5: gentlemen who didn't know he was being filmed and confronted
Speaker 5: one of the gunmen with a brick and he threw
Speaker 5: it at one of the shooters. He was one of
Speaker 5: the fatalities. He was one of the people who was murdered.
Speaker 5: And I'm just awestruck by the bravery of him, and
Speaker 5: obviously the bravery of all the other people involved, but
Speaker 5: particularly a very elderly gentleman who put himself directly in
Speaker 5: harm's way, may have even known that he would have
Speaker 5: died doing what he was doing and throwing a brick
Speaker 5: at a gunman, knowing that it's not going to be
Speaker 5: a great consequence, but trying anyway.
Speaker 4: I just think it's outstanding. Well, Thanks Johnny, Thanks Claire.
Speaker 2: Thanks me.
Speaker 1: Thanks Nicholas Jensen is the Australians Opinion editor and Johnny
Speaker 1: Bashan is a senior journalist. You can read all the
Speaker 1: latest on this developing story right now at the Australian
Speaker 1: dot com dot Au