“We know that Australia is not just silent when it comes to the genocide, but Australia is deeply complicit,” said Greens Senator David Shoebridge at the 25 February Palestine Action Group rally in Gadigal-Sydney’s Hyde Park.
This was the 20th such rally calling for an immediate and permanent ceasefire in the Gaza Strip to stop the genocide since October.
"Without Australian parts, those Israeli fighter jets could not fly and bomb Palestine. But Australia continues to send them, and build them and produce them," Greens Senator David Shoebridge said.
“Australian manufacturers, about 50 Australian companies, are key parts of the global supply chain for the F-35 fighter jets,” the senator, who’s been digging into these matters since our government started siding with the perpetrator of the most heinous colonial crime of the 21st century.
Not only has the Albanese government’s decision to support the Netanyahu government as it perpetrates a mass slaughter upon the Palestinians in Gaza, and then label this as Israel exercising its right to self-defence, but the entire political climate in this country has shifted in this direction.
These days, criticism of what the International Court of Justice ruled a plausible genocide is being equated with antisemitism, or prejudice towards Jewish people.
So, acts like Shoebridge speaking out on arms to Israel are unofficially forbidden. Indeed, protesting for Palestine is being framed as antisemitic.
And before the masses of Sunday protesters, who are now in no way considering voting for either major at the 2025 ballot, Shoebridge added that the public is aware arms and components have been exported to Israel as foreign minister Penny Wong’s own department has the details online.
“Penny Wong’s own department says in their published data that we have sent more than $10 million in arms and ammunition to Israel in the last five years,” Shoebridge detailed to the rally for Palestine, which has seen thousands every week show up in an unprecedented manner.
“Then when we ask her in the Senate why she will not stop Australia’s arms exports to Israel, she stares you in the face, and says that Australia has not sent any arms or ammunition to Israel in the last five years,” the Greens justice spokesperson added.
Sydney Criminal Lawyers downloaded the DFAT country and commodity pivot spreadsheet on Tuesday, which contains the figures relating to exports to Israel, and these include specific statistics relating to arms and ammunition exports to that nation.
So, despite the foreign minister’s denials that these exist, it’s that easy to access these figures.
The file contains a spreadsheet for all sorts of exports and provides monthly figures relating to AU$1,000 sums. The last arms and ammunition export listed was in October last year, which involved goods to the sum of AU$124,000.
Since 2007, Australian has shipped $38 million worth of arms and ammunition to Israel, and, during his time in office, PM Anthony Albanese has overseen $1.75 million worth of arms to the genocidal nation of Israel.
Shoebridge quizzed Wong over the Department of Foreign Affairs website in parliament on 5 December, yet she claimed no arms and ammunition exports to Israel over the past five years, while the spreadsheet specified there had been at the time, just as it does now.
Wong continued to claim that the information doesn’t exist, stating, “I know there’s a lot of disinformation and misinformation circulating… I would encourage the senator to make sure that he does not contribute to that.”
The Greens senator presented a legitimate question to the foreign minister and she, instead of answering it, avoided having to address the issue and rather accused her chamber colleague of dispersing “disinformation and misinformation”.
An elected politician dodging the truth that is readily available online on their own department’s site by charging another elected official as spreading mis- and disinformation isn’t what the constituency would expect, especially as these two terms are now quite damning. But voters are learning fast.
Greens Senator Dr Mehreen Faruqi was served up the same sort of aggressive manoeuvre on 6 February, after she asked Wong why she cut funding to the main aid channel into Gaza, UNRWA, on the day after the ICJ ordered Israel to immediately restore aid into the mass starvation site.
Wong dismissed the charge of anything being out of the ordinary on having cut funding to an Israeli-made famine, or that this was done on unsubstantiated claims, or that she’s neglected to condemn Israel, with the simple assertion that “so much in that statement… is false”.
Shoebridge was served a second helping on 8 February, when he again raised the DFAT site with Wong and pointed to then just released figures reflecting that $124,000 worth of arms and ammunition was shipped to Israel in October. And Wong again charged mis- and disinformation.
During a 15 February Senate estimates hearing, Shoebridge raised the arms and ammunition figures with DFAT chief economist David Woods, who outlined that these came to the department via the Australian Border Force and then the ABS, which he seemed to imply made them questionable.
“Surely that is the most credible data we have about arms and ammunition sales to the state of Israel then,” said Shoebridge.
The chief economist responded that Defence figures might be better, and the senator then pointed out that Defence doesn’t publish figures and neither does that agency speaks to the Australian Border Force.
“You pointing to Defence is like pointing to a red herring or a fish,” Shoebridge underscored, as he was again met with some distorted replies emanating from DFAT officials. “It has no connection with this chain of data,” he added.
“DFAT has no quality control over the data, neither does ABS or the ABF, except to the extent that we have exporters putting the data in,” Woods said, as he tried to discredit the data, which he is in charge of overseeing and, therefore, providing to the public as legitimate data.
Woods continued to further discredit his own figures, until Shoebridge concluded with, “Just to be clear, Mr Woods, I asked you earlier if there had ever been a suggestion that this data was not credible or a challenge to this data before the most recent conflict commenced.”
“I would say there has been no question or challenge to the credibility of any of the data that we publish, not just this,” Woods ended.
So why is the government insisting that Australia’s weapons trade with Israel doesn’t exist? Put simply, it is a case of tricky accounting. Checkmate ABC has established that this claim is drawn from a narrow definition of weapons counts used by the UN Register of Conventional Arms (ROCA). ROCA’s aim is to provide a record of transfers of completed builds of weapons between countries.
These numbers do not include weapon parts, as this would result in double counting, and ROCA is only interested in the total weapons traded. Whilst excluding part counts is appropriate for ROCA’s purposes, such an exclusion is grossly inappropriate for the purpose of reporting on Australia’s weapons trade.
The arms trade consists of an extensive global supply chain of parts, services, and maintenance contracts. Australia’s own Defence and Strategic Goods List explicitly states that ‘parts and accessories’ are military goods for the purpose of export controls. Critically, the Arms Trade Treaty, which is aimed at preventing the transfer of arms for use in war crimes restricts the export of ‘parts and components.’
Australia’s current export licences of weapons parts to Israel are almost certainly in breach of our domestic and international legal obligations. At present, over 70 Australian companies supply parts and maintenance to F-35 bombers. It is a matter of public record that every F-35 contains some Australian parts. Israel is already in possession of 50 F-35 craft and has placed an order for 25 more.
There is currently a legal action underway, brought by the Australian Centre for International Justice and other human rights groups, to try and access information about Australian defence export permits to Israel since October 7. It should not take a court action for the Government to release this information. In the UK for example, information pertaining to requests for export permits – which includes the name of the company, the nature of the export, and the dollar amount – is readily available.
Australians have the right to know whether their government is supplying weapons used to commit war crimes arms. Should the government continue supplying arms to Israel, they have a right to have these demands adjudicated in a court of law. The secrecy and mendacity must end.
Yesterday (28 February 2024) David Shoebridge called on the Government to stop the gaslighting and admit they are exporting weapons to the State of Israel, fueling the violence and destruction in Gaza.
People want Australia to be a force for good in the world, a force for peace
There has been much talk about nations’ and corporations being complicit in the war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide being committed by Israel in the wake of Hamas’ horrific attacks on October 7. Much of this discussion, and in fact action, has been taken in the context of governments approving the export of arms and other military supplies to the Israeli military.
A number of countries have suspended arms transfers to Israel, including Belgium, Italy and Spain. A Dutch appeals court recently made a ruling ordering the government of The Netherlands to cease all export and transit of Lockheed Martin F-35 fighter jet parts to Israel within 7 days on the basis of the clear risk of violations of international humanitarian law by Israel in Gaza. European Union officials have also made comments discouraging the export of arms exports to Israel.
In Australia there have been a number of defence export licences approved by the Albanese government to allow military/arms exports to Israel. This is in the context, as Greens Senator David Shoebridge uncovered this week “that Australia has directly exported over $10 million in ‘arms and ammunition’ to Israel over the past five years” according to the Commonwealth’s own data.
As Binoy Kampmark noted recently, “Canberra has approved 322 defence exports to Israel over the past six years. In 2022, it approved 49 permits for Israeli-bound exports; in the first three months of 2023, the number was 23.” Notably, and particularly so in the context of complicity in Israeli war crimes, the Albanese government has refused to reveal if any defence export licences concerning Israel have been approved since October 7. However, it is implausible that there would not have been given Australia’s shameful joined-at-the-hip relationship with Israel.
Assuming such export licences have been approved by the Albanese government, or that other military support direct or indirect, has been sanctioned by the government then this is arguably a case of complicity by key government ministers in the offences under the Rome Statute, to which Australia is a signatory, and which sets out crimes such as genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity. These offences are incorporated into Australian law through the Commonwealth Criminal Code, namely Division 268 (“Genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes and crimes against the administration of the justice of the International Criminal Court”) but also Division 80 Subdivision C (“Urging violence and advocating terrorism or genocide”).
There is also the possibility that executives of military and defence companies who are exporting to Israel from Australia and who are aware that their product is being used in the current conflict, could be complicit in the war crimes and crimes against humanity provisions of the Code.
But even if there were evidence that either government officials and/or corporate executives were arguably complicit in Israel’s actions, it would take the Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus to consent to a prosecution. This is a decision that is, remarkably and undemocratically, not reviewable in the courts.
So what is it that the Commonwealth AG should examine when there is a brief before him or her alleging complicity in Israel’s crimes against the Palestinians in Gaza by government officials and executives from corporations domiciled and/or operating in Australia?
Unfortunately there seems to be no clear criteria. This was made apparent in a recent response by Mr Dreyfus’ to Victorian senator Lidia Thorpe’s introduction of a bill to remove the AG’s consent which, as she has rightly pointed out, is unfettered.
The response of the AG, through a spokesman was revealing. While noting that the Albanese government “is firmly committed to its obligations under the Genocide Convention, and we have implemented our obligations under it”, the spokesman went on to say that given the seriousness of genocide offences “and in keeping with other offences that have international aspects the requirement for the Attorney-General to consent to prosecutions of genocide is appropriate.” There was no explanation by the AG or his office of what matters are relevant to take into account in the exercise of the discretion.
Lest it be thought Mr Dreyfus is the only AG to be timid on the issue of consent, he is not. Successive AG’s have been very reluctant to pursue alleged Australian involvement in overseas human rights abuses.
In her second reading speech on the bill, introduced in early February, Senator Thorpe notes “it has been pointed out that the low level of accountability that surrounds the Attorney-General’s decision-making powers exacerbates the problems that arise from the broad discretion and potential for real or perceived political bias.”
She is right. Consider it this way. Would an Attorney-General stand in the way of a prosecution for Rome Statute offences under the Criminal Code if the defendant had sold military surveillance equipment to China knowing, or being reckless to the probability, that it would be used to monitor the Uighur community? Or what about the case of a government official who facilitated a defence export licence to allow a company to supply the Zimbabwe defence force with weaponry? One would think not.
And, as was revealed on Four Corners this week, an indictment issued by the Rwandan government in 2017 for an alleged perpetrator of the 1994 Rwandan Genocide, one of the worst atrocities of the 20th century, has been languishing with the Commonwealth since 2017 and no action appears to have been taken by the AG or the Commonwealth whilst the man accused was let in through Australia’s immigration citizen, has become an Australian citizen and has been living in the suburbs of Brisbane. Perhaps even more surprisingly there hasn’t been even a whimper from Fear-Monger-in-Chief, Opposition leader Peter Dutton on this very serious issue.
In the context of the current Gaza conflict, it is important, in the context of what should happen to Australian government officials or others who are complicit in Israel’s genocide of Palestinians, that Article 1 of the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide places a positive binding obligation on the Australian government “to prevent and to punish” genocide. Australia was an eager earlier ratifier of the Genocide Convention, one of the first binding treaties of the post-WWII rules based international order. However, there unfortunately appears little evidence of this enthusiasm from our first law officer. And if Australia is being recalcitrant with its binding international legal obligations to the world of nations and humankind, why should we expect anything different from other countries? The truth is Australia can and should be doing much better on the erga omnes (rights or obligations are owed toward all) legal and moral obligation to prevent and punish genocide.
It undermines the rule of law in Australia and the world-at-large for a political figure like the Attorney-General to refuse, despite compelling evidence, a prosecution of any person who is complicit in Israel’s crimes in Gaza because they do not want to upset the strong relationship with that country.
If Australia really takes its Genocide Convention and Rome Statute obligations seriously it would remove political interference in prosecuting cases where a nation like Israel is assisted by Australian residents in the indiscriminate killing of men, women and children. It should not be one law for one nation but not another – justice is blind, right?
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