Review 22.7
11 May - 5 Jun , 1997

KILLING THEIR OWN: Imagine it. The Israeli Government announced last week that any Jews who sell land to Arabs will be executed. What would President Clinton do? What would Australia's intrepid UN ambassador do? What would every nation in the world do?

The Arab League would describe Israel as a fascist state, and call for total isolation of the "Zionist entity". Clinton would be horrified, and condemn it as barbarism. And Australia's ambassador would vote against Israel in the United Nations, probably more out of habit than understanding the issue. And they'd all be right. So why, after the Palestinian Authority of Yasser Arafat has actually executed an elderly Palestinian man from Jerusalem (the same city the PA wants sovereignty over), is the world doing nothing?

Okay, so it gets a few column inches in the newspapers, with a mild berating of the practice alongside scathing criticism of Israel for its interrogation procedures. The fact that the Israelis have prevented over 90 terrorist attacks and saved many lives with information they received from interrogations is ignored.

But just to show that ignorance was applied equally, the media completely ignored the Palestinian Authority's announcement that the death sentence will be executed not just on Palestinians who sell their land to Jews in the territories, but also inside Israel. First to decry the wrongs of "extra-terriorial legislation", our intrepid media scribes and commentators failed to acknowledge this most heinous of laws. The hypocrisy is even more evident when contrasted to the reaction to the death fatwa placed on British author Salman Rushdie.

Rushdie is the subject of an evil law, and the innocent Palestinian real estate agent, 70 year old Farid Bashiti, who was executed by the Palestinian Authority, for selling land to Jews, is entitled to nothing less than justice. Israeli police have a Palestinian police officer in custody for the murder.

Whatever the international criticism of Israel, deserved or not, there is a hideous double standard at work here. The Palestinian Authority, which has long turned a blind eye to terrorism against Israeli civilians, and routinely tortures its own people often resulting in their death (practices which make Israel's interrogation policies pale in comparison), is killing its own.

WELCOME CRITICISM: On May 8, the Prime Minister criticised Pauline Hanson directly. He still did not say that she is racist, but what he said was telling enough. "She is wrong when she suggests that Aboriginals are not disadvantaged. She is wrong when she says that Australia is in danger of being swamped by Asians. She is wrong to seek scapegoats for society's problems. She is wrong when she denigrates foreign investment, because its withdrawal would cost jobs. She is wrong when she claims that Australia is headed for civil war. She is wrong in not having distanced herself from her supporters who have made irresponsible calls for legalisation of the type of weapon that Martin Bryant used."

Australia's Prime Minister, John Howard, said that Pauline Hanson is wrong. Unfortunately, he was leading from behind.

Foreign Minister Alexander Downer kicked off the assault on Pauline. "Those policies which include banning foreign investment and a racially discriminatory immigration policy, would cripple Australia in its economic and political relations with the region," he said. Deputy PM, Tim Fischer agreed, telling Australians diplomats, "It would rip up our bread ticket for the next century, indeed the next millennium."

Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs Philip Ruddock was scathing of Hanson's claims about immigrants to Australia. "Mrs Hanson claimed by the year 2040, 53.6% of our population would be Asian. This has no basis in fact," he said, "If we are going to have a debate on immigration, the leader of a political party has a responsibility to deal in fact, not fiction." Currently about 4.8% of the Australian population is Asian born and on current migration patterns over the next 30 years, the Asian born population of Australia will be around 7.5%.

Retiring Senator Jim Short also spoke passionately about the effect of Hanson on Australia. He described to the Senate on May 7, "the wonderful privilege I have had ... virtually all my political career, including in particular my three years as Shadow Minister for Immigration and Ethnic Affairs, of meeting and working with Australians whose origins reflect the richly diverse, harmonious, tolerant, multicultural nation that is the Australia of the late 1990s and the envy of almost every other nation on Earth... I would have expected that it is self-evident that we are a nation blessed by this richness of cultural and ethnic origins and the very special qualities it has produced. But it is clear that that is not the case. We cannot ignore that people like Pauline Hanson - with narrow, prejudiced, negative, distorted, divisive, insular views, widely inaccurate facts and a lack of any acceptable rational policy proposals - have a certain following in Australia today."

Senator Robert Hill, Minister for the Environment, described Hanson as "dangerous" and "promoting a terrifying, isolationist direction." Federal Treasurer Peter Costello also joined the barrage. "It's time to say Pauline Hanson is out of excuses, her ideas are bankrupt, she has no plan for Australia and the divisive and vicious future that she is promulgating will be repudiated," he said.

It was left to former Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser, under whose government multiculturalism crystallised, to sum it up and lay out the challenge to Howard in a May 7 Australian opinion article. "Now that a vigorous attack has been launched by senior government ministers, it must be carried through. This is a matter for the heart; it is a matter for which there can be no compromise. An Australia noticeably influenced by the One Nation party would be a pariah among civilised nations. Whatever the polls currently say, that can't be allowed to happen."

CORRECTION: In the previous edition of the Review, a special report, "Dangerous Imagery" appeared. This was an edited version of a report, Anti-Semitism in the Egyptian Media produced and published by the Anti-Defamation League of B'nai B'rith in the United States. The attribution was erroneously delted during the sub-editing process.