Credit where it’s due to Penny Wong, for being one of the few senior Labor figures to stand up to the left’s almost-complete surrender to anti-Semitism.
Wong can be just as grubbily opportunist as any politician: she opposed gay marriage right up to the point that it was an obvious political liability to do so. But, on the issue of Israel, at least, she should be welcomed for taking a principled stand.
Opposition foreign affairs spokeswoman Penny Wong has condemned an anti-Israel resolution backed by Queensland Labor Party members, as Jewish groups have accused the Left faction-dominated state branch of using “talking points disseminated by Hamas”.
Wong’s criticism is all the more welcome because she is such a beloved intersectional poster-girl for the right-on left.
A left which, more and more openly, hates Jews.
Her comments come after a resolution accusing Israel of “ethnic cleansing” won the support of a majority of delegates at Queensland Labor’s state conference on the weekend.
The branch, which is dominated by the Left faction, also accused Israel of being solely responsible for the recent conflict in Gaza, which it said was “sparked by the forced evictions in Sheikh Jarrah to remove Palestinians from their homes and replace them with Israeli settlers”.
The resolution “condemns” Israel for a number of disputed accusations, including the “ongoing Israeli annexation by stealth of Palestinian land” and the “ethnic cleansing of Palestinians through the expansion of illegal settlements”.
The resolution also “recognises” the “routine oppression and dehumanisation of Palestinian people, denying their dignity and rights to self-determination (and) condemning them to live under perpetual Israeli occupation”.
They might as well have got Hamas to write the resolution for them. In fact, it would be no surprise to find that local Hamas sympathisers were involved.
Adam Slonim, the co-convener of the Australia Israel Labor Dialogue, said the resolution passed on the weekend “demonises Israel and creates a double standard that no one else is held to”. Mr Slonim warned that there was a growing strain of anti-Semitism within the ALP and the broader public[…]
“When you see a motion like this that demonises, delegitimises, doesn’t discuss at all the 4300 rockets fired by Hamas on Israeli citizens … when you have these ‘three Ds’ you are moving from anti-Zionism to anti-Semitism.”
Zionist Federation of Australia president Jeremy Leibler accused Queensland Labor of parroting the “talking points disseminated by Hamas – a designated terrorist organisation”.
Not that Wong’s federal mates have got much to be proud of, either.
Federal Labor in March for the first time recognised the state of Palestine in its national platform, despite strong opposition from some members of the party’s Right faction.
The Australian
Penny Wong has also had some surprisingly sensible things to say about China. Sure, Wong criticises the Morrison government, but that doesn’t mean that her critiques are completely wrong: notably that the government has wasted years in not building up Australia’s defence credibilities.
But, while criticising the government (well, Labor is the opposition, after all), Wong is also hitting out at China, in a way that few others in the opposition will.
In comments as tough as Morrison’s, she rightly observes that under Xi Jinping, Beijing’s “assertion has often transmuted into aggression”.
She also demonstrates a clear-eyed understanding of the causes of this: “There is an ideological dimension to Xi Jinping’s nationalism — for him no less than Mao”.
She accuses Beijing of economic coercion, abrogating One Country Two Systems in Hong Kong and weakening human rights at the UN, pledges Labor to a continued strong position on the South China Sea and denounces Beijing’s “wolf warrior diplomacy” and “hysterical pronouncements from the Global Times”.
The Australian
So, yes, credit where it’s due: Penny Wong is taking on the anti-Semites on the left.
Meanwhile, her boss poses for selfies with Jeremy Corbyn.
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