Albanese pressured to act on antisemitism after Melbourne attacks
MELBOURNE SYNAGOGUE ATTACK
The Albanese government has called the fire at a Melbourne synagogue on Friday an “attack on Australia” as it comes under renewed pressure to tackle antisemitic attacks.
The AAP this morning reports there “were at least four antisemitic attacks in Melbourne at the weekend, including the alleged firebombing of a synagogue”.
The report highlights how Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke and former attorney-general Mark Dreyfus visited the East Melbourne synagogue yesterday, with Guardian Australia quoting Burke as saying at the scene: “[This] is not simply an arson attack; what matters here is there is an attack on Australia, an attack on Australian values. And we are here today in solidarity to stand together with the community.”
Dreyfus said the federal government condemned all the incidents on Friday night, the ABC reports. “It needs to be understood that this [alleged] attack on this old synagogue here in the centre of Melbourne is an [alleged] attack not just on the Jewish community, it’s an [alleged] attack on the entire Australian community,” the former attorney-general said.
“The entire Australian community sets its face against this kind of hatred.”
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has also said those responsible for the “shocking acts” must face the full force of the law, while Victorian Premier Jacinta Allan is expected to attend the synagogue on Monday, AAP reports.
Guardian Australia reports “a 34-year-old man from New South Wales has appeared in court, charged over allegedly entering the grounds of the East Melbourne Hebrew Congregation on Albert Street at about 8pm on Friday, pouring a flammable liquid on the front door of the building and setting it on fire.”
Federal opposition frontbencher Melissa McIntosh appeared on ABC’s Insiders yesterday, where she called on Albanese to convene an urgent meeting of national cabinet to deal with antisemitism.
Burke would not comment on whether the government would take such action, Guardian Australia flags, adding that now was a moment for “unity”. The site says Burke defended Labor’s efforts to curb antisemitism but said the job of ensuring it is eliminated “belongs to every single one of us”.
The Home Affairs minister also said he had spoken to the Israeli ambassador in Australia, who thanked him for visiting the East Melbourne synagogue. “He took it as a signal that the government was taking this very seriously,” Burke said.
Meanwhile, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has taken to social media demanding action be taken by the Australian government.
Netanyahu is due to meet with US President Donald Trump in Washington on Monday, where the BBC reports the latter is very keen to announce a significant breakthrough in the Gaza ceasefire talks.
The British broadcaster says an Israeli delegation was sent to Qatar yesterday for proximity talks with Hamas on the latest proposal for a ceasefire and hostage release deal.
ALBO HEADING TO CHINA, RATE CUT EXPECTED
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s trip to China this week has generated quite the range of articles over the weekend.
The Australian Financial Review has led overnight on another intervention by ambassador Xiao Qian, who, according to the paper, is championing deepening economic ties between Canberra and Beijing “as a way to end the growth slump”.
The report says China “is looking to capitalise on Australia’s fraying ties with the United States by enlisting Anthony Albanese in its tech and trade war with Donald Trump”. That move apparently involves an expansion of an existing free trade agreement so that it includes things such as the digital economy and artificial intelligence.
Writing in the AFR, Xiao said: “Over the past three years, through the joint efforts of both sides, China-Australia relations have stabilised and improved, achieving a comprehensive turnaround. Standing at a new historical starting point, now is the time to advance bilateral relations with steady progress.”
The newspaper highlights Albanese is set to meet with President Xi Jinping and Premier Li Qiang in Beijing during his almost week-long visit, which will have a significant focus on trade and investment.
The report goes on to make the obvious comparison between Albanese’s expected reception in China and the current state of the relationship with America. Also jumping on that comparison is Coalition leader Sussan Ley.
The Nine papers report Ley has questioned the wisdom of Albanese’s alleged emphasis on foreign policy independence at a time when the Trump administration is taking such actions as reviewing the future of the AUKUS defence pact.
“At a time of global uncertainty, growing conflict and a growing list of issues in the Australia-United States relationship, now is a time to build our influence in Washington, not diminish it,” Ley said in a statement. “Many Australians will wonder whether this speech at this time was in our national interest, given so many things crucial to Australia’s future are currently being considered by the US administration.”
On Saturday, Albanese used the 80th anniversary of the death of Labor’s wartime prime minister John Curtin to talk up the former leader’s Australia-first instincts, the Nine papers highlight.
“John Curtin is rightly honoured as the founder of Australia’s alliance with the United States. A pillar of our foreign policy … that commands bipartisan support, respect and affection. Yet our alliance with the US ought to be remembered as a product of Curtin’s leadership in defence and foreign policy, not the extent of it,” Albanese is quoted as saying. “As Paul Keating put it in his John Curtin Memorial Lecture: ‘Curtin began us thinking in our own terms. So we remember Curtin not just because he looked to America. We honour him because he spoke for Australia.”
Elsewhere, the Reserve Bank of Australia’s rate-setting board meets again today and will announce on Tuesday what it plans to do with interest rates.
Guardian Australia reports the central bank is expected to cut the cash rate for the third time this year, with the economics teams at the country’s four largest banks predicting a quarter of a percentage point cut to 3.6%.
The financial markets predict “consecutive 0.25 percentage point rate cuts in July and August, followed by a third by November”, the article adds.
The Australian Financial Review says the widespread expectation of the first back-to-back interest rate cut since the COVID-19 pandemic was “because of easing inflation and sluggish economic growth, with some forecasters predicting as many as six more cuts by the end of next year”.
The Australian and Herald Sun both lead this morning on the Victorian Labor party’s polling lead, with the latter saying that if an election were held right now, the Allan government would win comfortably, delivering Labor a historic fourth successive term.
New Redbridge polling shows just 38% of Victorians backing the Coalition, which the Herald Sun says is five points less than when Brad Battin took over as leader in December. The Australian says its latest Newspoll shows Labor holds a 53-47% lead on a two-party-preferred basis, but chooses instead to lead on 59% of respondents saying the party didn’t deserve to be reelected.
The Victorian state election isn’t due until next year.
ON A LIGHTER NOTE…
Joey “Jaws” Chestnut ate 70 and a half hot dogs and buns in 10 minutes to win the annual Nathan’s Fourth of July hot dog eating contest on Friday.
The Guardian says the victory cements the 41-year-old’s status as “the undisputed all-time champion of hot dog consumption”.
The newspaper points out Chestnut was excluded from last year’s competition in New York after he signed a deal with a plant-based meat company.
Before his return to the tournament this year, Chestnut wrote on social media: “I’m thrilled to be returning. This event means the world to me. It’s a cherished tradition, a celebration of American culture, and a huge part of my life. While I have and continue to partner with a variety of companies, including some in the plant-based space, those relationships were never a conflict with my love for hot dogs. To be clear: Nathan’s is the only hot dog company I’ve ever worked with.”
The Associated Press reports Chestnut’s winning total (his 17th victory in 20 appearances) fell slightly short of his record of 76 wieners and buns set in 2021.
Say What?
Today, the America Party is formed to give you back your freedom.
Elon Musk
While the world’s richest man thinks he’s launching a new party in America, The New York Times points out “any new entity would be required to be disclosed to the Federal Election Commission” and that no paperwork had so far been filed.
CRIKEY RECAP
Australia’s silence on genocide gives Netanyahu a free pass to exterminate Palestinians
While the claim to Australian “complicity” in genocide was overstated by the Greens, it is now clear that Australia’s silence, along with that of other Western countries, has most assuredly had an influence on Netanyahu’s actions. He and his supporters may have systematically pursued genocide and ethnic cleansing against Palestinians anyway, but they have increasingly done so in open and indeed blatant ways.
They have done so because they can, knowing that Western countries will not even describe their actions as genocide or ethnic cleansing, no matter how brazen — let alone take actions that would materially damage Israel’s interests.
Albanese is thus too humble in his estimation of Australia’s influence in the Middle East: our deafening silence, along with that of other countries, has led to ever more Palestinians being slaughtered, attacked and dispossessed in a program of extermination and forcible displacement that is open for the world to watch. And watch is all we do.
Experts say Albanese should ‘rethink’ our relationship with America. Why start now?
With Foreign Affairs Minister Penny Wong in the US last week for Quad talks, experts and the commentariat have again raised the question of what “new approach” the Albanese government should take to its relationship with the erratic and transactional Donald Trump administration.
But of course, we’ve never been one to let events change our approach, which has — more often than not — just been whichever approach we’re asked to take by the US.
On AI, News Corp treads a fine line between profit and reporting
News Corp’s national broadsheet, The Australian, reported on the Cloudflare announcement with an article titled “Cloudflare blocks ChatGPT and other AI bots from ‘ripping off’ content, ‘saving’ online publishers”.
Published in the July 3 print edition, it quotes media companies describing the new wave of AI companies using news websites to train their models — and subsequently creating a boom of users turning to AI chatbots rather than traditional internet search for information — as “AI armageddon”.
The Australian quotes the CEOs of Conde Nast (which licenses the likes of Vogue and GQ magazines in Australia to News Corp), US digital media company Dotdash Meredith, Pinterest and Reddit in support of the new Cloudflare move. However, it neglects to mention that News Corp itself is probably the Australian publisher that has licensed the most content to AI companies.
READ ALL ABOUT IT
‘Abhorrent, totally unacceptable’: Defence protects its reputation, not women (The Age)
Hannah Thomas warned to ‘prepare for worst’ after serious eye injury (The Sydney Morning Herald)
Australian doctors call for clampdown on social media influencers allegedly glamorising poker machines (Guardian Australia)
At least 21 children among dozens killed in Texas floods, as 11 girls from camp still missing (BBC)
Australian celebrity chef Peter Russell-Clarke dies aged 89 (ABC)
The real Salt Path: How a blockbuster book and film were spun from lies, deceit and desperation (Observer)
THE COMMENTARIAT
Melbourne synagogue fire shows Australia’s multicultural project needs urgent help — Patricia Karvelas (ABC): The attacks on Jewish people in Melbourne on Friday night should send chills down the spines of all Australians — Jewish and non-Jewish — who value diversity, culture and the right to be safe.
The Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke was right to describe it as an attack on Australia. Australians pride themselves on being fierce defenders of multiculturalism.
You will often hear ministers on both sides of politics describe our nation as the greatest multicultural country on Earth. We are right to aspire to this standing but it is highly contestable that we have achieved it.
Sussan Ley must fight to return the Liberal Party to the broad church that embodies Australia’s enduring values — Arthur Sinodinos (Guardian Australia): In 1996, John Howard improved the electability of the Coalition by taking the rough edges off many Fightback era policies, including embracing Medicare and putting a safety net under industrial relations reforms.
One pole of the big tent is addressing climate change in a pragmatic fashion. The weather is changing and nations that adapt quickly will gain a first mover advantage. Business and communities can see what is coming and are moving to address the issue, even if some governments want to turn back the clock. Most Australians will support sensible measures that provide affordable, abundant and clean energy with appropriate backup. The British Conservative Party crossed this bridge some time ago. Failing to engage on the issue in a factual way makes it almost impossible to talk to those who regard this as a high priority, such as younger voters and Teal supporters.
