I have a friend Julian King, who Duncan Graham reports has been subjected to a stun grenade as our Australian Federal Police burst through his door to seize his PhD research, phone and computers. Reportedly, the AFP are concerned about OPM (Organisasi Papua Merdeka _Free Papua Organisation), the indigenous independence movement in West Papua. I Continue reading »
International Relations
The dramatic ‘rebel’ advance into Aleppo dominates the headlines. In history rather than headlines, however, the importance of current events shrinks into relativity, as the ‘West’ and its regional allies have been tearing apart, or trying to tear apart, Syria for more than a century. This is what the journalist and historian Patrick Seale called Continue reading »
Viktor Orbán’s obsequious letter to Benjamin Netanyahu offering him sanctuary from the International Criminal Court (ICC) in Hungary is not a surprise. It is another red flag in the Islamophobic world of the transnational Right. The mass and prolonged slaughter of Palestinian Muslims (and Christians) cannot be seen as a crime committed against other humans Continue reading »
Australia has willingly become the “epicentre of the projection of US power in the Indo-Pacific”. It does not make Australia safer. It makes Australia the epicentre for any retaliation to that projection of power. The government justifies this vulnerable position on the basis of our “shared values and democracy” and our shared commitment to uphold Continue reading »
When recently sacked by Netanyahu, Gallant, in an emotional speech said: “Israel has fallen into moral darkness”. This is what Zionism has internally inflicted on Judaism – moral decay. The security threat suffered by good Jewish people globally is what Zionism has inflicted externally. Despite Gallant prosecuting Israel’s war in a savage manner as minister Continue reading »
If Australia is to have any influence at all in resolving the horrendous carnage now taking place in the Middle East it needs to demonstrate that it acts independently of American pressure. The politicians who lament the fraying of our ties with Israel seem totally unconcerned about the impact of our position on countries far Continue reading »
Forty four years ago today as I am writing this (17/11/80) the harbinger of Donald Trump appeared in The New Yorker magazine. TV critic George W.S. Trow wrote a long essay (which later became a book) titled ‘Within the context of no context,’ giving notice to the world of what we now see unfolding across Continue reading »
The horrific situation in the Middle East has landed Foreign Minister Penny Wong with a difficult and frustrating job. She is wedged between a so-far unacknowledged obligation to honour Australia’s legal commitments to condemn Israeli genocide and apartheid on the one hand, and on the other, a vociferous campaign by local Zionists and their supporters Continue reading »
The ongoing genocide in Gaza forces us to confront an uncomfortable reality: why does the West seem to prioritise some conflicts while others, particularly in Africa, go unnoticed? It raises a critical question: does race…does colour influence how Western nations choose where to focus their attention and resources? Take Israel, for example. It achieves significant Continue reading »
A major new report has detailed the “extraordinary economic opportunity” for Australia to replace its coal and gas exports with decarbonised commodities, and reap six to eight times more than the typical revenues it earns from fossil fuels, and help other major economies to meet their own climate goals. But renewed calls for Australia to Continue reading »