Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned that Australia’s support for a UN motion calling for the expulsion of Israeli settlers would spark anti-Semitic terror attacks, just a day before a Melbourne synagogue was firebombed.
Two people were injured early Friday morning after the Adass Israel synagogue in Ripponlea was attacked.
Rabbi Gabi Kaltmann said “two thugs” had broken the windows of the synagogue before pouring gasoline on the ground and setting it on fire as Jewish worshipers prepared to pray shortly after 4am.
Worshipers were forced to flee the building and two people suffered minor injuries in an attack which Prime Minister Anthony Albanese described as a “shocking incident”.
‘It should be condemned unequivocally: there is no place in Australia for an outrage like this; “Attacking a place of worship is an attack on Australian values,” he said.
“Attacking a synagogue is an act of anti-Semitism, it is attacking the right that all Australians should have to practice their faith in peace and security.”
The latest anti-Semitic attack came just three days after Australia joined 156 other nations at the United Nations in calling on Israel to expel settlers from the West Bank and Gaza and “end its illegal presence” in the occupied Palestinian territories. “as quickly as possible.” ‘ – with the Labor Party undoing two decades of bipartisan consensus.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned Australia that its support for a UN motion on creating a Palestinian state would spark anti-Semitic terror attacks, just days before a Melbourne synagogue was firebombed.
Two people were injured early Friday morning after the Adass Israel synagogue in Ripponlea was attacked.
The motion also called for a conference to be held in New York to facilitate an “irreversible path” toward a Palestinian state.
A day before the synagogue attack, Netanyahu said The Australian that Australia’s support for that UN motion would “invite more terrorism” and “more anti-Semitic riots” in Western universities and urban centres, “including in Australia”.
Netanyahu’s office sharply criticized Australia for rewarding Hamas for massacring 1,200 people in southern Israel and taking 254 others hostage during a massacre that also included torture and rape.
‘On the contrary, they have embraced those atrocities that included the rape, murder and beheading of Jews. “It is a shame that the current Australian government wants to grant statehood to these savages,” his office said.
Netanyahu’s message was addressed to Albanese, who was previously secretary of Australia’s Parliamentary Friends of Palestine, and Foreign Minister Penny Wong.
Israel is frustrated with the Labor Party for reversing two decades of bipartisanship in which both sides of politics had refrained from tabling motions calling on the Jewish state to withdraw from the West Bank.
Opposition leader Peter Dutton said Labor had “sold out the Jewish community” to shore up its support in western Sydney electorates with a larger Muslim vote.
A day before the synagogue attack, Benjamin Netanyahu told The Australian that Australia’s support for that UN motion would “invite more terrorism” and “more anti-Semitic riots.”
Australia was not one of the eight nations that voted against the UN motion, putting it on the opposite side of a key defense ally: the United States, Israel, neighboring Papua New Guinea, along with Argentina , Hungary and the United Kingdom. Federated States of Micronesia, Nauru and Palau.
Instead, Australia joined key US allies Canada, the UK and New Zealand in backing the motion critical of Israel.
Senator Wong argued that Palestinians should no longer suffer because of Hamas.
“Australia supports and has historically been a friend of Israel, and Australia supports a two-state solution,” he said in New Zealand.
‘We have been clear that we want the cycle of violence that we are all witnessing to end.
‘We want to contribute as much as we can with our partners to peace and a two-state solution.
“We have made it clear that Palestinian civilians can no longer pay the price of defeating Hamas.”
Senator Wong and her New Zealand counterpart, Winston Peters, issued a statement on Friday criticizing Israel’s bombing campaign in Gaza.
“They respected Israel’s right to defend itself, but noted that the right to self-defense was not unlimited and needed to comply with international law, including international humanitarian law,” they said.
‘The ministers expressed alarm at the humanitarian situation in Gaza and called on Israel to do more to allow safe, rapid and unhindered humanitarian access.
“They stressed that civilians, as well as humanitarian and health workers, must be protected.”
As recently as September, he abstained on a motion calling for Israel to end its “unlawful presence” in Gaza and the West Bank within 12 months.