WEBVTT - The enabling of neo-Nazis 0:00:01.639 --> 0:00:06.320 I'm Ruby Jones and you're listening to seven AM. Last weekend, 0:00:06.440 --> 0:00:10.319 Neo Nazis gathered outside New South Wales Parliament. Organizers had 0:00:10.360 --> 0:00:13.040 registered the protest with the police and nothing was done 0:00:13.039 --> 0:00:16.480 to stop it going ahead. When two female politicians spoke 0:00:16.520 --> 0:00:19.320 out against the protests, they were targeted with threats of 0:00:19.400 --> 0:00:22.160 violence and death. The premier said there will be an 0:00:22.160 --> 0:00:25.360 investigation into how this was allowed to happen, but the 0:00:25.360 --> 0:00:28.720 protest is not isolated. Neo Nazis have been gathering in 0:00:28.760 --> 0:00:31.840 cities and towns in recent months, marching through streets and 0:00:31.960 --> 0:00:35.840 terrorizing communities. Back in September, they marched from an anti 0:00:35.840 --> 0:00:39.440 immigration rally and descended on Camp Sovereignty, a sacred place 0:00:39.440 --> 0:00:42.199 for First Nations people in the heart of Melbourne. They 0:00:42.280 --> 0:00:46.240 attacked people who were gathered there. Today writer and seven 0:00:46.280 --> 0:00:49.560 AM host Daniel James on what happened at Camp Sovereignty 0:00:49.640 --> 0:00:57.960 and the response from authorities. It's Sunday, November sixteen, and 0:00:58.080 --> 0:01:01.000 this episode was originally published in September. 0:01:03.760 --> 0:01:05.240 So Daniel, let's. 0:01:05.040 --> 0:01:09.000 Begin by talking about the attack on Camp Sovereignty in Melbourne. 0:01:09.120 --> 0:01:12.399 That attack was captured on video, some of it was 0:01:12.560 --> 0:01:16.960 streamed live on Facebook. So can you walk me through 0:01:17.200 --> 0:01:18.200 what we know happened. 0:01:18.800 --> 0:01:24.000 It's a scene that Aboriginal people, through the history of colonization, 0:01:24.600 --> 0:01:28.600 are all too familiar with. It was all filmed. There 0:01:28.640 --> 0:01:31.640 was a sixteen minute Facebook live stream that captured the 0:01:31.680 --> 0:01:35.800 whole thing. Ran about five pm on Sunday, as the 0:01:35.920 --> 0:01:40.720 light was fading. There were a handful of people as 0:01:40.760 --> 0:01:43.640 custodians of camp. So I'm already sitting around the campfire. 0:01:43.680 --> 0:01:48.280 There dozens of men dressed in black approached from the west. 0:01:48.680 --> 0:01:51.560 Then all of a sudden start running towards the camp, charging, 0:01:51.640 --> 0:01:55.840 yelling all sorts of things, and started tearing the camp apart, 0:02:03.240 --> 0:02:07.440 started attacking some of the people there, who are mainly 0:02:07.680 --> 0:02:13.079 Aboriginal women. They were beaten, people were kicked in the stomach, 0:02:13.440 --> 0:02:24.639 thrown to the ground. Unfortunately and horrifically, this is actually 0:02:24.680 --> 0:02:28.400 the third confrontation between now Nazis and Camp members that 0:02:28.600 --> 0:02:32.040 day and a lot of questions are being asked about 0:02:32.040 --> 0:02:35.120 how it could happen. There was a huge police presence 0:02:35.240 --> 0:02:38.000 within the city. You would expect that there would be 0:02:38.520 --> 0:02:42.080 a degree of intelligence being shared between authorities in the city, 0:02:42.560 --> 0:02:46.880 and even if there wasn't. Unfortunately, this attack on camp 0:02:46.919 --> 0:02:49.359 soeverbrity was entirely predictable. 0:02:50.960 --> 0:02:54.840 Well, let's talk about why Neo Nazis targeted this site 0:02:54.880 --> 0:02:58.880 in particular, what is cap sovereignty, Why is it sacred? 0:02:59.080 --> 0:03:00.000 Why did they pick it? 0:03:00.280 --> 0:03:02.400 The main reason they picked it was because there was 0:03:02.440 --> 0:03:05.400 easy pickings for them. It's an area that is open 0:03:05.760 --> 0:03:09.840 to the public. It's available for anyone to go along 0:03:09.919 --> 0:03:13.239 and participate and sit around the campfire there and learned 0:03:13.240 --> 0:03:16.520 out why it is a sacred site. And the reason 0:03:16.560 --> 0:03:18.960 it's a sacred site is that it's a burial site 0:03:19.040 --> 0:03:23.600 in King's domain and the location of a permanent vigual 0:03:23.680 --> 0:03:26.639 that has been set up there since January twenty twenty four. 0:03:27.320 --> 0:03:31.400 The site is a reminder of First Nations people's survival. 0:03:32.240 --> 0:03:35.080 It is a place that is an invitation to the 0:03:35.080 --> 0:03:39.160 rest of the community to come along and sit beside 0:03:39.200 --> 0:03:43.880 Aboriginal people and find out what happened here. They came 0:03:43.960 --> 0:03:48.040 by after being trumped up at the Raleigh for Australia, 0:03:48.160 --> 0:03:52.200 on which their main head, Honcho Thomas Sill, who was 0:03:52.240 --> 0:03:55.960 a New Zealand born now Nazi and the leader of 0:03:56.040 --> 0:03:58.400 their group that we'd seen, was not only just given 0:03:58.400 --> 0:04:01.320 a microphone, he was actually given the keynote address on 0:04:01.360 --> 0:04:03.440 the steps of Parliament House in Melbourne. 0:04:04.120 --> 0:04:07.800 Not this new Australia that they're trying to build, but 0:04:08.000 --> 0:04:12.040 our Australia, the Australia we were bred in and raised it. 0:04:12.600 --> 0:04:14.400 And on the back of that, that's the kind of 0:04:14.480 --> 0:04:18.280 validation these type of characters need. And so they would 0:04:18.279 --> 0:04:21.960 have walked away feeling validated, they would have felt emboldened. 0:04:22.920 --> 0:04:27.000 And unfortunately Camp Soeverrety is a place that is open 0:04:27.320 --> 0:04:29.320 for neo Nazis to come and defile. 0:04:30.560 --> 0:04:33.280 Let's talk a little more about the rally, how it 0:04:33.320 --> 0:04:36.680 came about, who was there, because in the days leading 0:04:36.760 --> 0:04:39.159 up to it there was talk about it being about 0:04:39.200 --> 0:04:45.360 immigration and about housing, and obviously some of that frustration 0:04:45.520 --> 0:04:49.560 that some people were feeling was weaponized by neo Nazis. 0:04:49.160 --> 0:04:53.599 Like Thomas Seule. So what role do you think that 0:04:53.640 --> 0:04:58.200 australia Is media and political landscape played in how this 0:04:58.360 --> 0:05:00.440 all unfolded In the. 0:05:00.400 --> 0:05:06.080 Lead up to the march for Australia was one that 0:05:06.400 --> 0:05:12.119 was characterized by ordinary Austrains being fed up with things 0:05:12.200 --> 0:05:15.760 like the cost of housing, portioning the blame at the 0:05:15.800 --> 0:05:17.680 feet of immigrants. 0:05:18.040 --> 0:05:22.000 Crime is clearly up as a result of mass immigration 0:05:22.200 --> 0:05:25.719 in certain areas, and we're continually told on top of 0:05:25.720 --> 0:05:28.880 that that Australia is built on stolen land and that 0:05:28.920 --> 0:05:30.800 our history is something to be ashamed of. Is it 0:05:30.880 --> 0:05:35.640 any wonder then that so many regular mums dads are upset? 0:05:35.960 --> 0:05:39.279 But if you actually have a look at any sort 0:05:39.279 --> 0:05:42.320 of social media page, it was clear from the very 0:05:42.440 --> 0:05:45.599 very outset that this was a rally that was organized 0:05:45.600 --> 0:05:49.640 by extremists, both inside and outside the Parliament. It was 0:05:49.640 --> 0:05:53.520 something that neo Nazis were always going to attend, and 0:05:53.600 --> 0:05:57.480 there was an attempt to mainstream it by trying to 0:05:57.520 --> 0:06:00.920 get everyday Australians to come up long and attend. And 0:06:01.520 --> 0:06:04.159 for my sins, I listened to talk back on a 0:06:04.200 --> 0:06:06.600 regular basis. I don't know why I do it, but 0:06:07.480 --> 0:06:10.880 I was listening on Sunday afternoon and a woman called 0:06:10.960 --> 0:06:15.000 up a commercial radio station here in Melbourne and she 0:06:15.120 --> 0:06:17.800 was going to the anti immigration rally, as she said, 0:06:17.800 --> 0:06:18.840 for her grandchildren. 0:06:19.200 --> 0:06:24.000 We're doing this because Victoria and Australia isn't the way 0:06:24.520 --> 0:06:28.640 it used to be, and you know, we're doing it 0:06:28.680 --> 0:06:29.799 for our grandchildren. 0:06:30.520 --> 0:06:33.840 Her voice was very interesting, it trembled, but there was 0:06:33.880 --> 0:06:37.960 also a defiance in her voice as well. You could 0:06:38.000 --> 0:06:41.719 sense that she was engraved danger of the Australia that 0:06:41.880 --> 0:06:46.680 she knew slipping away, and was mirrored in the evening 0:06:46.720 --> 0:06:48.719 too when I listened to talk back as well. It 0:06:48.760 --> 0:06:52.200 was just people that were insisting that they were there peacefully. 0:06:52.720 --> 0:06:56.040 They were there as an act of love. But there 0:06:56.080 --> 0:06:59.400 wasn't too much about the speech that the Nazi gave. 0:06:59.560 --> 0:07:02.520 There was no think about the racist placards that were 0:07:02.560 --> 0:07:06.120 also there. There was nothing about the fights or the 0:07:06.160 --> 0:07:09.000 police court and that had to separate them from other 0:07:09.080 --> 0:07:12.640 protesters in the city for various reasons. And then of 0:07:12.680 --> 0:07:16.720 course the grandmothers of the world, rightly or wrongly, are 0:07:16.760 --> 0:07:19.400 therefore able to give cover for what it was and 0:07:19.440 --> 0:07:26.920 that was basically a far right Nazi rally coming up. 0:07:27.080 --> 0:07:47.000 Should this attack be treated as an act of terrorism. 0:07:38.320 --> 0:07:40.800 Prime Minister, welcome, good afternoon, Patricia. 0:07:40.920 --> 0:07:43.920 Do you think there were good people with legitimate concerns 0:07:43.920 --> 0:07:45.960 at these anti immigration rallies this weekend? 0:07:46.120 --> 0:07:49.000 Of course, there's always good people will turn up to 0:07:49.040 --> 0:07:53.800 demonstrate their views about particular issues. But what we have 0:07:54.040 --> 0:07:59.760 here is neo Nazi has been given a platform that's in. 0:07:59.760 --> 0:08:03.400 The wake of the marches. On the weekend, the Prime 0:08:03.400 --> 0:08:07.440 Minister and the Albanesi said that while there were quote 0:08:07.520 --> 0:08:10.400 good people who attend to the is rallies, they were 0:08:10.440 --> 0:08:15.560 ultimately about selling division. So let's talk about that response. 0:08:15.840 --> 0:08:17.000 What do you make of it. 0:08:17.280 --> 0:08:20.040 This is not a time for our politicians to be 0:08:20.760 --> 0:08:23.960 really doing about with this. This is not a time 0:08:25.000 --> 0:08:29.280 for clever politicians like Anthony Albernesi and clever politicians like 0:08:29.360 --> 0:08:31.840 Susan Lee to try and weave their way through some 0:08:31.880 --> 0:08:32.800 sort of middle road. 0:08:33.000 --> 0:08:33.280 Here. 0:08:33.480 --> 0:08:37.120 What units is Australians will always be stronger than those 0:08:37.160 --> 0:08:39.760 who seek to divide us. That unity is at risk. 0:08:40.280 --> 0:08:42.920 The Coalition stands ready to work with the government to 0:08:43.000 --> 0:08:47.360 repair our social cohesion. This is a moment the demands leadership. 0:08:47.640 --> 0:08:50.679 The Prime Minister must show that leadership now. 0:08:51.559 --> 0:08:53.880 We are now in a situation where we have neo 0:08:53.960 --> 0:08:59.439 Nazis openly on the street preaching hate against minorities, against 0:08:59.480 --> 0:09:04.160 immigrants and its First Nations people in the open. These 0:09:04.200 --> 0:09:07.480 extreme views are now being centralized, They are now being 0:09:07.840 --> 0:09:11.800 embedded within the mainstream politics of this place itself. If 0:09:11.800 --> 0:09:14.200 you want to look at the Victoria Liberal Party, for instance, 0:09:14.240 --> 0:09:18.600 you will find people that hold extreme views within the Parliament. 0:09:19.480 --> 0:09:22.040 It's very alarming to see what I would term as 0:09:22.080 --> 0:09:25.200 a placid response from our political leaders. 0:09:25.600 --> 0:09:27.800 They weren't big numbers in the scheme of things in 0:09:27.800 --> 0:09:31.920 a nation of almost twenty seven million people. Let's be 0:09:32.040 --> 0:09:33.640 clear here, So you do think. 0:09:33.520 --> 0:09:37.120 This is a tiny proportion of the Australian population, this 0:09:37.160 --> 0:09:38.520 anti immigration center. 0:09:38.320 --> 0:09:40.280 That shows that that was the case. 0:09:40.320 --> 0:09:41.240 And there's always been. 0:09:41.240 --> 0:09:43.120 The attack on camp so I already hasn't yet been 0:09:43.200 --> 0:09:45.760 dubbed a hate crime or a terrorist attack, but what 0:09:45.880 --> 0:09:48.600 other way could you describe it? It wasn't a fight 0:09:48.640 --> 0:09:52.400 over property, it wasn't an aggravated burglary. It was there 0:09:52.480 --> 0:09:56.360 to destroy the camp and to destroy in many ways 0:09:56.440 --> 0:10:01.720 the movement that Aboriginal people have set up for ourselves there. 0:10:02.400 --> 0:10:06.400 So the response from our political leaders so far has 0:10:06.520 --> 0:10:10.200 been wishy washy at best and appeasing at worst. 0:10:13.600 --> 0:10:17.160 And so late yesterday afternoon Thomas Saw and two others 0:10:17.280 --> 0:10:19.600 were arrested in relation to the attack. 0:10:20.320 --> 0:10:24.760 What are the victoria you're under arrested with the fury 0:10:24.760 --> 0:10:25.560 of yourself. 0:10:26.240 --> 0:10:29.960 Of course, there were many other people involved. So as 0:10:30.040 --> 0:10:32.880 the investigation goes on, what do you think needs to 0:10:32.880 --> 0:10:33.680 happen from here. 0:10:34.040 --> 0:10:35.560 What do we need to do from here? I mean, 0:10:35.920 --> 0:10:39.520 my view is that the sovereign citizen movement and the 0:10:39.800 --> 0:10:44.640 Nazi movement in Australia need to be categorized as terrorist 0:10:44.720 --> 0:10:48.720 groups because they are becoming increasingly emboldened. People are dying, 0:10:49.000 --> 0:10:51.760 people are getting beaten up, and it's fraying at the 0:10:51.760 --> 0:10:57.360 civility of our society. And the mainstream media has a 0:10:57.400 --> 0:11:00.800 fair degree of blame when it comes to that. The 0:11:00.840 --> 0:11:03.960 algorithms that our social media sites that we use, such 0:11:04.000 --> 0:11:06.840 as Meta, send people down rabbit holes so deeply that 0:11:06.880 --> 0:11:09.000 there is seemingly no way for them to come back 0:11:09.040 --> 0:11:11.720 and join us here in the real world. We need 0:11:11.760 --> 0:11:15.360 to start taking this incredibly seriously, and I'm not sure 0:11:16.160 --> 0:11:20.920 that our political leadership or our security agencies are taking 0:11:20.920 --> 0:11:24.120 this as seriously as they should. What happened on Sunday 0:11:24.200 --> 0:11:25.200 should never have happened. 0:11:25.600 --> 0:11:28.480 And when you look at the scale of what occurred, 0:11:28.800 --> 0:11:32.040 it's estimated that there were more than twenty thousand people 0:11:32.120 --> 0:11:35.800 attending these protests in cities across the country, which is 0:11:36.000 --> 0:11:39.080 not an insignificant amount of people. So what does that 0:11:39.120 --> 0:11:42.040 reveal to you about where the country is at right now? 0:11:42.080 --> 0:11:47.480 And the extent to which these beliefs have taken hold. 0:11:47.160 --> 0:11:50.800 They've become more and more mainstream, they have become more 0:11:50.840 --> 0:11:55.280 and more acceptable. The level of hate that is fired 0:11:55.440 --> 0:11:59.440 at our authorities, at our political leadership, the level of 0:11:59.440 --> 0:12:03.280 hate that is of course fired at Aboriginal people and 0:12:03.640 --> 0:12:08.000 other marginalized communities is out in the open, and so 0:12:08.080 --> 0:12:13.319 people are being emboldened to say these things. And the 0:12:13.320 --> 0:12:15.240 more that these things are said, and the more that 0:12:15.240 --> 0:12:18.040 these things are heard, the more likely it is that 0:12:18.080 --> 0:12:19.960 there is going to be action like we saw on 0:12:20.000 --> 0:12:23.280 Sunday against innocent people at Camp Sovereignty. 0:12:24.160 --> 0:12:26.280 I describe it as an act of terror, actually, as 0:12:26.280 --> 0:12:31.480 a terrorist act terrorize those follow herselves, very scary for 0:12:31.559 --> 0:12:32.120 those people. 0:12:32.640 --> 0:12:35.959 Uncle Robbie Thorpe, he's one of our respected elders here 0:12:36.120 --> 0:12:40.400 and basically the man who can be attributed to setting 0:12:40.480 --> 0:12:43.800 up Camp Soeverrity. He's made a very good point. There 0:12:43.800 --> 0:12:45.640 has been new hate laws that have come out to 0:12:45.720 --> 0:12:49.520 protect places of worship, and this is something that Senator 0:12:49.559 --> 0:12:53.960 Lydia Thorpe has also come out and question. She's asked 0:12:53.960 --> 0:12:56.840 the question, how do you define a place of worship? 0:12:57.600 --> 0:13:01.640 Aboriginal places of worship, there are no Buildingsstensibly, Camp Soeverrity 0:13:01.800 --> 0:13:04.079 is a place of worship. It's a place of remembrance. 0:13:04.120 --> 0:13:07.160 It is a place where we go to hell and 0:13:07.679 --> 0:13:10.000 to move forward and to educate. Is that a place 0:13:10.040 --> 0:13:12.520 of worship? And should that be protected under hate laws? 0:13:13.120 --> 0:13:15.960 We have covered for mosques and synagogues, and rightfully so. 0:13:16.840 --> 0:13:20.520 But the question needs to be asked. Can Aboriginal people 0:13:21.280 --> 0:13:26.360 worship their elders, worship their own spirituality, worshiped land without 0:13:26.880 --> 0:13:30.239 fear of being attacked by Nazi extremists? 0:13:31.320 --> 0:13:34.600 And the people who were attacked at Camp Sovereignty, how 0:13:34.600 --> 0:13:35.280 are they doing? 0:13:35.760 --> 0:13:40.120 Deeply, deeply rattled? For people were injured, two were taken 0:13:40.160 --> 0:13:43.080 to hospital with head wounds. But I think it's fair 0:13:43.160 --> 0:13:46.640 enough to say that the whole Aboriginal community has been 0:13:46.880 --> 0:13:51.480 injured by this. What happened on Sunday was had all 0:13:51.520 --> 0:13:54.960 the hallmarks of a massacre. We've had hundreds of massacres 0:13:55.040 --> 0:13:59.080 in this country at the hands of white men approaching 0:13:59.480 --> 0:14:04.000 camps at low light when there are only a handful 0:14:04.040 --> 0:14:08.160 of people around to commit acts of violence. Now, the 0:14:08.200 --> 0:14:11.000 only thing that was separate from what happened on Sunday 0:14:11.200 --> 0:14:14.360 and what has happened throughout the history of this place 0:14:15.040 --> 0:14:16.920 was the body count and the fact that there were 0:14:17.000 --> 0:14:19.440 witnesses there, the fact that there were people filming it. 0:14:19.720 --> 0:14:21.520 One would hate to think what would happen if this 0:14:21.600 --> 0:14:24.640 was actually out in the bush somewhere and a group 0:14:24.680 --> 0:14:30.440 of emboldened Neo Nazis came upon an aboriginal campsite. How 0:14:30.480 --> 0:14:33.120 far could it have gone? These are questions that are 0:14:33.120 --> 0:14:35.400 not rhetorical. These are questions that need to be asked 0:14:35.720 --> 0:14:39.200 with a degree of sobriety in the cold, hard light 0:14:39.320 --> 0:14:43.920 of day, because these movements are getting away from the authorities, 0:14:43.920 --> 0:14:47.640 They're getting away from our ability to contain them, and 0:14:47.680 --> 0:14:50.040 they have shown that once they've given a little bit 0:14:50.080 --> 0:14:53.480 of validation, they become more and more emboldened, more and 0:14:53.560 --> 0:14:57.560 more extreme, And I just hate to think what will 0:14:57.600 --> 0:14:58.200 happen next. 0:15:00.840 --> 0:15:03.280 Well, Daniel, thank you so much for speaking with me. 0:15:03.640 --> 0:15:16.400 Thanks Ruby, thanks for listening. 0:15:16.600 --> 0:15:18.920 Tomorrow, Daniel James will bring you an interview with one 0:15:18.920 --> 0:15:22.720 of Australia's leading political observers, the writer and former advisor 0:15:22.800 --> 0:15:26.200 to two Prime ministers, Sean Kelly. Sean has just written 0:15:26.200 --> 0:15:28.720 a new quarterly essay where he considers the vision Anthony 0:15:28.720 --> 0:15:32.360 Albereneze holds for Australia. He explores whether Albaneze is more 0:15:32.400 --> 0:15:35.120 interested in staying in government or changing the country for 0:15:35.160 --> 0:15:38.000 the better, interrogating which issues the PM is willing to 0:15:38.000 --> 0:15:40.680 take on and where that leaves us. It'll be a 0:15:40.720 --> 0:15:44.760 fascinating conversation. I'm Ruby Jones. This is seven am. Thanks 0:15:44.760 --> 0:15:45.280 for listening.