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Pro-Hezbollah Protests Are a Threat to Australian Society
Illustrative: Supporters of Hamas gather for a rally in Melbourne, Australia. Photo: Reuters/Joel Carrett
Last weekend, a large group of protestors in Melbourne and Sydney, waved Hezbollah flags and displayed photographs of assassinated Hezbollah terror chief, Hassan Nasrallah.
Hezbollah is a proscribed terrorist organization in Australia, so this kind of public support is illegal, yet this did not stop the protestors from turning out and chanting anti-Israel slogans through the streets of Australia’s biggest cities.
Unfortunately, Australia has regularly experienced this kind of open hatred.
Just one day after the October 7 Hamas massacre, a frenzied group of demonstrators gathered on the steps of the iconic Sydney Opera House, burning Israeli flags and chanting “f…k the Jews” and “Where’s the Jews?”
That violent display of hate should have been shut down immediately, but it wasn’t — marking the beginning of what would be a difficult year for Australia’s Jewish community, with weekly protests often descending into intimidation, violence, and antisemitism.
Law enforcement has kept order, but mostly seemed determined to avoid levying any actual charges against the perpetrators.
This hatred on the streets of Australia has not been helped by radical imams who have praised Hamas’ terror attacks and spouted hateful, antisemitic rhetoric.
After Nasrallah’s death, one mosque in Sydney issued a notice publicizing a vigil to be held for him, called him a “righteous martyr.” This was followed by a hateful sermon calling for Israel’s defeat, which cited a notorious tradition accusing the Jews of rejecting Allah and having distorted the Torah.
Particularly disturbing in these demonstrations is the open support from members of The Greens political party, including its deputy leader, Mehreen Faruqi, who frequently accuses Israel of committing genocide. Faruqi, a regular at anti-Israel demonstrations since October 7, attended the pro-Hezbollah rally in Sydney and spoke to the crowd.
Another Greens Senator attended a pro-Hezbollah rally in Adelaide, the capital city in South Australia.
In response to the actions of the Greens, Foreign Minister Penny Wong condemned “any indication of support for a terrorist organisation such as Hizballah,” adding that “All of us — including every political leader –must stand together to reject terrorism and extremism.”
Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke also warned of potential visa cancellations for any non-citizens waving the Hezbollah flag.
Meanwhile, Opposition Home Affairs Senator James Paterson accused the government of displaying “equivocation and ambivalence in the face of an anti-Semitism crisis,” and warned that unless there were consequences, “the extremism we have seen on our streets today will continue to flourish.”
Opposition Leader Peter Dutton reiterated this, saying it was “completely unacceptable” that there haven’t been arrests yet or the cancelling of visas of people who “glorify” terrorist groups.
The Australian Federal Police have also confirmed that they have been asked to investigate at least six people from the pro-Hezbollah rallies in Melbourne and Sydney.
Despite its vast distance from Israel, Australia is experiencing, like many other countries, an explosive increase in antisemitism after the October 7 attacks. Jewish schools and other communal buildings have been forced to increase security measures that were already tight before October 7.
Indeed, there are many in the Jewish community — including Holocaust survivors — who are currently living in fear.
An online WhatsApp group of 600 Jewish creatives was “doxxed” by pro-Palestinian activists, causing many of them to be subjected to death threats and ongoing harassment, and others losing employment opportunities.
It is simply outrageous that in a multicultural tolerant country like Australia, which also has the largest per-capita number of Holocaust survivors outside of Israel, the glorification of terrorist leaders can be so brazenly displayed and tolerated.
It is imperative that governments, state and federal, and law enforcement crack down on this behavior, otherwise there is a risk to the cohesive fabric of Australian society.
Justin Amler is a policy analyst at the Australia/Israel & Jewish Affairs Council (AIJAC).
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Germany: 5 Killed, Scores Wounded after Saudi Man Plows Car Into Christmas crowd
Magdeburg Christmas market, December 21, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Christian Mang
i24 News – A suspected terrorist plowed a vehicle into a crowd at a Christmas market in the German city of Magdeburg, west of the capital Berlin, killing at least five and injuring dozens more.
Local police confirmed that the suspect was a Saudi national born in 1974 and acting alone.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz expressed his concern about the incident, saying that “reports from Magdeburg suggest something bad. My thoughts are with the victims and their families.”
Police declined to give casualty numbers, confirming only a large-scale operation at the market, where people had gathered to celebrate in the days leading up to the Christmas holidays.
The post Germany: 5 Killed, Scores Wounded after Saudi Man Plows Car Into Christmas crowd first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Syria’s New Rulers Name HTS Commander as Defense Minister
A person waves a flag adopted by the new Syrian rulers, as people gather during a celebration called by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) near the Umayyad Mosque, after the ousting of Syria’s Bashar al-Assad, in Damascus, Syria, Photo: December 20, 2024. REUTERS/Ammar Awad/File Photo
Syria’s new rulers have appointed Murhaf Abu Qasra, a leading figure in the insurgency which toppled Bashar al-Assad, as defense minister in the interim government, an official source said on Saturday.
Abu Qasra, who is also known by the nom de guerre Abu Hassan 600, is a senior figure in the Islamist Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) group which led the campaign that ousted Assad this month. He led numerous military operations during Syria’s revolution, the source said.
Syria’s de facto leader Ahmed al-Sharaa discussed “the form of the military institution in the new Syria” during a meeting with armed factions on Saturday, state news agency SANA reported.
Abu Qasra during the meeting sat next to Sharaa, also known by the nom de guerre Abu Mohammed al-Golani, photos published by SANA showed.
Prime Minister Mohammed al-Bashir said this week that the defense ministry would be restructured using former rebel factions and officers who defected from Assad’s army.
Bashir, who formerly led an HTS-affiliated administration in the northwestern province of Idlib, has said he will lead a three-month transitional government. The new administration has not declared plans for what will happen after that.
Earlier on Saturday, the ruling General Command named Asaad Hassan al-Shibani as foreign minister, SANA said. A source in the new administration told Reuters that this step “comes in response to the aspirations of the Syrian people to establish international relations that bring peace and stability.”
Shibani, a 37-year-old graduate of Damascus University, previously led the political department of the rebels’ Idlib government, the General Command said.
Sharaa’s group was part of al Qaeda until he broke ties in 2016. It had been confined to Idlib for years until going on the offensive in late November, sweeping through the cities of western Syria and into Damascus as the army melted away.
Sharaa has met with a number of international envoys this week. He has said his primary focus is on reconstruction and achieving economic development and that he is not interested in engaging in any new conflicts.
Syrian rebels seized control of Damascus on Dec. 8, forcing Assad to flee after more than 13 years of civil war and ending his family’s decades-long rule.
Washington designated Sharaa a terrorist in 2013, saying al Qaeda in Iraq had tasked him with overthrowing Assad’s rule and establishing Islamic sharia law in Syria. US officials said on Friday that Washington would remove a $10 million bounty on his head.
The war has killed hundreds of thousands of people, caused one of the biggest refugee crises of modern times and left cities bombed to rubble and the economy hollowed out by global sanctions.
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Sweden Ends Funding for UNRWA, Pledges to Seek Other Aid Channels
View of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) building in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip. Photo: Abed Rahim Khatib / Flash90.
i24 News – Sweden will no longer fund the U.N. refugee agency for Palestinians (UNRWA) and will instead provide humanitarian assistance to Gaza via other channels, the Scandinavian country said on Friday.
The decision comes on the heels of multiple revelations regarding the agency’s employees’ involvement in the October 7, 2023, Hamas-led massacre in southern Israel that triggered the war in Gaza.
Sweden’s decision was in response to the Israeli ban, as it will make channeling aid via the agency more difficult, the country’s aid minister, Benjamin Dousa, said.
“Large parts of UNRWA’s operations in Gaza are either going to be severely weakened or completely impossible,” Dousa said. “For the government, the most important thing is that support gets through.”
The Palestinian embassy in Stockholm said in a statement: “We reject the idea of finding alternatives to UNRWA, which has a special mandate to provide services to Palestinian refugees.”
Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Sharren Haskel thanked Dousa for a meeting they had this week and for Sweden’s decision to drop its support for UNRWA.
“There are worthy and viable alternatives for humanitarian aid, and I appreciate the willingness to listen and adopt a different approach,” she said.
The post Sweden Ends Funding for UNRWA, Pledges to Seek Other Aid Channels first appeared on Algemeiner.com.