VISIT ISRAEL with the Australia-Israel Chamber of Commerce - November 2013

COMPLIMENTARY INFORMATION BRIEFING SESSION - Tuesday 30 July 12-2pm at the Chamber of Commerce & Industry WA

AICC Australia-Israel Chamber of Commerce(WA) Inc invites you to participate in our Mission to Israel scheduled for Thursday 28 November to Wednesday 4 December 2013.

The AICC has been organizing Missions to Israel for over 20 years, during which there have been over 40 separate group missions of varying sizes. They are always presented in the context of a historical, cultural, industrial and policy perspective and as such, I am confident the mission will provide you and other delegates with a memorable, stimulating and meaningful experience and above all, linkages to generate real business opportunities.

Next Steps:

If you wish to discuss any aspect of the mission, kindly contact John Cluer on 0419 938 480, or if you would like to receive the full Mission Brochure and Expression of Interest e-mail:  diane@aicc.org.au

Complimentary Information Briefing Session will be held from 12 to 2pm in the Chamber of Commerce & Industry (CCIWA) Function Centre, 180 Hay Street East Perth. This session will be attended by Mr Paul Israel, from our Tel Aviv office.  The purpose of the session is to answer your questions, clarify all elements of the mission and to hear from the delegates who have been on our missions.

To register : RSVP to Diane at diane@aicc.org.au or call 0402 344 352.  If you cannot attend this briefing, please indicate your interest by informing Diane and we will contact you.

The Battle of El Alamein and Jewish Survival

by Michael Meyer

Michael Sutherland MLA, Member for Mount Lawley and Speaker of the Western Australian Legislative Assembly and Barry House, President of the Upper House invited a number of members of the Perth Jewish community to a talk by Kelvin Crombie at the Western Australian Parliament House on 25^th June.

Kelvin Crombie is an author who made an intensive study of the history of Australian troops’ involvement in both the 1^st and 2^nd Word Wars in the Middle East and has written five books concerning the history of the period in Israel after 1798, mostly associated with the British and Anzacs, and has co-produced several documentaries on the same subject.  His main work on the Anzacs is entitled ‘Anzacs, Empires and Israel’s Restoration 1798-1948.’  His latest book is entitled “El Alamein – Halting an Impending Holocaust in the Middle East”.
Kelvin spoke about the battles of Tobruk and El Alamein in which allied forces consisting mainly of British, Australian, New Zealand, South African and Indian troops, fought against the German army under the command of Field Marshall Erwin Rommel in the Libyan and Egyptian deserts from April 1941 to November 1942.
He spoke of how victory at the second battle of El Alamein of the allies, under the command of Field Marshal Viscount Montgomery,is regarded as one of the significant turning points of the Second Word War and of how the defeat of the Germans prevented a possible holocaust in the Middle East.  Kelvin described how the Germans has formed a Einzatskommando, mobile SS death squad, which was to carry out a mass killing of Jewish people in British mandate of Palestine similar to the way they operated in eastern Europe. "Einsatzkommando Egypt" was standing by in Athens and was ready to disembark for Palestine in the summer of 1942, attached to the "Afrika Korps"  The Middle East death squad was similar to those that operated throughout Eastern Europe.  Approximately 700,000 Jewish people lived in Egypt, the British mandate of Palestine, Syria and Iraq at the time.
Kelvin brought the “Montgomery Bible” to the talk.  The Bible was an official gift given to Field Marshal Montgomery by the National Council of Palestine Jewry (the Jewish government in British mandate of Palestine prior to May 1948) in recognition for his role in saving the Jewish community in from the impending German forces.
The Montgomery Bible is the Old Testament (Tanach), the cover of which is encased in silver and ivory.  The words on the inscription accompanying are:

“Field Marshal Viscount Montgomery, GCB, DSO, the gallant leader of the victorious forces by whose hand God has placed salvation in Zion in the days of El Alamein presented in token of the everlasting gratitude of Palestine Jewry by the Vaad Leumi, General Council of the Jewish Community in Palestine”.

Kelvin presented to the Premier, Colin Barnett and the Speaker, Michael Sutherland a gift of a photograph of the official ceremony of the surrender of Jerusalem by the Turks at the Citadel inside Jaffa Gate on 11 December 1917.  British commander General Allenby is seen facing a semi-circle guard of honour, which included the 10th Light Horse from Western Australia.  He asked that the photograph be hung in Parliament House.

Kelvin ended his talk by addressing the Premier and the other parliamentarians present, saying that the threat facing Jews in Israel and around the world is real and that those who wish to destroy the Jewish people are no less fervent than the Nazis and that it is their responsibility to ensure that anti-Semitism is not permitted to thrive in Australia and Western Australia.

El Alamein and the Jewish Survival – A Book Review

by Shirlee Finn, Sydney, December 3, 2012

Little did I realise when I went to [NSW] State Parliament recently for the launch of Kelvin Crombie’s new book, “El Alamein and the Jewish Survival” that  I was in for such a special treat…writes Shirlee Finn.

I must admit my main interest initially was to see the Tanach – Old Testament, which was presented to Field Marshal Montgomery as an official gift of gratitude for his role in saving the Jewish community in Palestine from the impending conquest by the German-led forces commanded by General Rommel.

Not only was it emotional seeing such a part of the History of Palestine, it was an extremely informative talk about the whole war time history of the region and how grateful the Jews of Palestine were for the Australian Forces keeping them safe.
The words on the inscription attached to the Tanach and encased on the cover in silver and mother of pearl are:

“Field Marshal Viscount Montgomery, GCB, DSO, the gallant leader of the victorious forces by whose hand God has placed salvation in Zion in the days of El Alamein presented in token of the everlasting gratitude of Palestine Jewry by the Vaad Leumi, General Council of the Jewish Community in Palestine”.

During the twenty four years he lived in Israel Kelvin heard from dozens of older Jewish people about the importance of the battle of El Alamein for the survival of the Jewish people in the land of Israel. One of these was Professor Alex Carmel from Haifa University. In the late 1980’s Kelvin and Prof Carmel together tracked down the Tanach, which the Jewish leadership of Eretz Israel had given to General Montgomery after the victory at El Alamein, at the UK office of CMJ (Churches Ministry among Jewish People). It was hidden away and forgotten.
Kelvin brought this Bible back to Israel and displayed in the museum at the Heritage Centre, of Christ Church in the Old City of Jerusalem, which he had established. He used it when lecturing Israeli groups about Gentile involvement in the restoration of Israel. Most of those gallant soldiers at El Alamein and other battles which fought the Axis (German and Italian) forces in the region were Gentiles– whose very presence hindered the penetration of the Holocaust into the Middle East.
It is currently in Australia in Kevin’s care for the 70^th anniversary of the battle of El Alamein, fought in 1942.
Kelvin Crombie grew up in rural Western Australia, listening to stories of the Anzacs from uncles who served in the Middle East in the Australian Army during the Second World War; and also due to various direct Israeli connections such as an Israeli family on a nearby farm; and the Six Day War in 1967.
He subsequently went to Israel in 1979, this in turn led to him developing a very keen interest in Israel and the Jewish people. He was not a practicing Christian and he is not Jewish. He went to Israel in 1979, as he told me, because he was searching.  In the process he found his faith in G-d. He met and married his Dutch wife in Israel, where they lived for 24 years and raised their four daughters.
In 1986 Kelvin was asked by to become the guide at Christ Church, the Anglican church in the old City of Jerusalem, hosting thousands of people monthly, including secular Israelis studying the beginning of modern history in Jerusalem and the land of Israel.
As a guide he not only lectured these numerous groups but also had to undertake considerable research. During this research he discovered numerous historical artifacts. These included several large and unique models of Jerusalem as well as the largest portrait of Jerusalem, the 1879 Jerusalem Panorama a painting and the very special Montgomery Bible. One model, discovered by Kelvin in 1986 was made in Jerusalem in 1864 revealed a tunnel going under Christ Church. In that same year, 1986, the tunnel was re-discovered, but not excavated.
Kelvin pioneered the ‘In the footsteps of the Light Horse’ tours, doing his first of over hundred tours to Beersheba in 1988. In 2007 he was one of the main instigators of the re-enactment of the Charge of Beersheba and was the guide for the Light Horse tour. He periodically guided or spoke to Australian diplomatic, military and trade delegations visiting Israel.
He has written five books concerning the history of the period in Israel after 1798, mostly associated with the British and Anzacs, and has co-produced several documentaries on the same subject. His main work on the Anzacs is entitled ‘Anzacs, Empires and Israel’s Restoration 1798-1948.’
In 1992 Kelvin travelled to El Alamein and together with Allied, German and Italian veterans recalled the 50^thanniversary of this battle. Shortly later during a meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, he spoke of his visit to El Alamein. Rabin then spoke quite passionately about the danger then facing the Jewish people in Eretz Israel had the Germans won at El Alamein. A similar attitude was voiced by General Uzi Narkiss (the commander of the Israeli forces who captured Jerusalem in 1967) when Kelvin also interviewed him. It was clear that this sentiment was known by every section of the Jewish community who lived in the land of Israel during that traumatic period.
This present book goes more in-depth on this subject matter than his two previous books relating to the Middle East during the Second World War (Anzacs, Empires and Israel’s Restoration 1798-1948&Anzacs & Israel) and includes more material from German sources. Apart from providing historical data, it reveals some of the motives behind this Nazi-Muslim agenda for destroying the Jewish communities of the Middle East. This aspect is important as similar forces of evil are still in evidence today.
El Alamein and the Jewish Survival” was launched at Christ Church in Jerusalem early in November. In the House of Lords in London November, at a meeting convened by the present Viscount Montgomery, this past week in Parliament House in Sydney and 2nd December at the ‘Friends of Israel Western Australia’  ‘Gallipoli to Jerusalem Day’ in Perth. It is also planned to have the ‘Montgomery Bible’ on display at these functions.
There is so much more to this very interesting man. Over the years Kelvin has become involved with other ANZAC military heritage and commemoration projects in Israel. He is a participating member of the Association of the Heritage of the First World War and was one of the initiators of the 2007 Ride of Peace and re-enactment of the 1917 Light Horse charge at Beersheba where he guided the seventy-strong group of horsemen.
Kelvin is occasionally asked by the Australian Embassy, the Australia/Israel & Jewish Affairs Council, the Israel-Australia Chamber of Commerce, the Australian Army and others (including recently a WA Government delegation) to provide exposure to visiting delegations concerning the ANZAC involvement in the land of Israel.
He has also completed in conjunction with the ‘Hatikvah Film Trust’ a documentary detailing this entire story entitled ‘From Exile to Restoration’ (in Britain, ‘The Destiny of Britain’, and in USA, ‘The Cyrus Call’).

Australian Muslims are being radicalised in Syria

From the ABC 7:30 report, 30/05/2013, by Caro Meldrum-Hanna (Follow the link to view the video and for a full transcript):

Up to 100 Australians are thought to be fighting in Syria at the moment and authorities fear young Australian Muslims are being radicalised on home soil as a program in a Western Sydney bookstore suggests.

The spectre of home-grown terror has haunted security agencies in countries like Australia since 2001.
...Authorities' concerns are being heightened by the bloody conflict in Syria. It's become a magnet and a new training ground for militants around the world, including in Australia.
To date, four Australians have died fighting in Syria against the Assad regime and a hundred Australians are currently believed to be on the frontline, even though it's illegal under Australian law.
...Caro Meldrum-Hanna's been investigating...
CARO MELDRUM-HANNA, REPORTER: ...this [video] ...Yusuf Toprakkaya, a Melbourne bricklayer and a father...was killed in Syria last year. In this tribute video posted online after his death in December, 2012, he's shown making detonators for bombs and on night patrol with rebels in Syria, proof that he was involved in fighting at the frontline, a criminal act under Australian law.
...Yusuf Toprakkaya was well known to Australian authorities. He was named in this secret 2010 cable from the US Embassy in Canberra, requesting 23 Australians be added to the terrorist screening database.
...AARON ZELIN, WASHINGTON INSTITUTE FOR NEAR EAST POLICY: ...four Australians ...have ended up with martyrdom notices on jihadi forums. And there have been many foreigners who have died in Syria, but not all of the individuals who are foreigners who die in Syria end up with having martyrdom notices on jihadi forums. Therefore I think ...they ... joined up with some rebel forces.
...CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: When news of Majzoub's death hit Sydney, hundreds of young Muslim men flocked to the Al Risalah Bookstore in Bankstown, Western Sydney to pay him tribute.
PREACHER [in Sydney]: But I warn the youth today... will we waste the blood of the martyrs?
CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Since it opened just over one year ago, Al Risalah Bookstore has gained a reputation as a centre of Islamic extremism. Sheikh Majzoub gave his final lecture here.
...CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: What do you know of the Al Risalah Bookstore in Bankstown?
JAMAL DAOUD, SOCIAL JUSTICE NETWORK: Al Risalah Bookstore especially is very secret, very secretive. They conduct their business in a very secretive way.
...I tried, I tried to explore who's behind this group. We can't. It is very secretive. This is very worrying for us in a democracy to have some secretive organisation. They conduct all their businesses in very secretive way....
CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: 7.30 has been investigating al Risalah's activities and the speeches made by a number of sheiks, urging Australians to get involved in Syria.
This is Sheikh Abu Sulayman, picture here delivering a lecture at the Al Risalah Bookstore last year, encouraging his audience of young Muslim men to join the jihad in Syria.
ABU SULAYMAN, MUSLIM SHEIKH: We're calling day and night for us to support them with our wealth and with our blood and with whatever we possess.
CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: This is Sheikh Omar El Banna who also gave a lecture at Al Risalah last year. He made this speech, titled Syria is my Responsibility, in western Sydney.
OMAR EL-BANNA, SHEIKH: I want to pass on two points. That you are responsible for what's happening there. ... What should we be do? When one organ is in pain, the remaining parts of the body, they show care. ... In Syria now, the problem, Allah will ask you, "What did you do?"
CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: This is Musa Cerantonio. ....Once an Italian Christian, now a passionate convert to Islam, teaching at Al Risalah. Here Musa Cerantonio promotes the Al-Qaeda-backed jihadist group Jabhat al-Nusra in Syria.
MUSA CERANTONIO: Allah willing, as one of the leaders Jabhat al-Nusra said: "If we take this (Damascus) - and I don't want to give false hope - but if we take this, Allah willing, victory is near."
CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Al Risalah has another even more infamous sheikh. Abu Suhaib, known to the authorities as Bilal Khazal, a former baggage handler for Qantas, trained at a military camp in Afghanistan and a confidante of Osama Bin Laden. Khazal was lecturing at Al Risalah until mid-2012 when he was convicted and sentenced to nine years' jail for producing a do-it-yourself terrorism book. Al Risalah posted this video of Khazal online titled "Final advice before his imprisonment":
ABU SUHAIB, MUSLIM SHEIKH: We ask God Almighty for victory and that the Islamic state rises up.
CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Do you believe that these bookstores are radicalising young men?
JAMAL DAOUD: Definitely. If you go inside and read what DVDs and books they're distributing, it's all about radical Islam.
CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: The possibility that extremist sheikhs are radicalising youth at home before they go to Syria has Australian authorities on high alert.
Are you aware of the sheikhs behind Al Risalah and what they're teaching, preaching?
NICK KALDAS, NSW DEPUTY POLICE COMMISSIONER: Um, I am aware of Al Risalah and I'm aware of some of the activities that go on and some of the individuals involved, yes
CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Would it concern you if these sheikhs and teachers at Al Risalah were promoting violent jihad?
NICK KALDAS: All of that has to be of concern, certainly. But I would also say that our federal authorities are very much involved in some of the issues you've just raised, certainly in term of fundraising and people going - leaving Australia and going to fight overseas. The federal authorities have to be involved and have privacy in a lotta those issues.
CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: If there's evidence of that though, of this radicalisation ...
NICK KALDAS: It is of concern. It's definitely of concern....

‘Kingdom Culture’ conference 27-28th August

Peter Tsukahira (from Mt Carmel Assembly, Israel) is returning to Perth for a special two night conference, entitled ‘Kingdom Culture’ on Tuesday the 27^th & Wednesday the 28^th of August, to be held at Subiaco Church of Christ.

See the brochure below, with full registration details. 

 

 

This conference, smaller than his previous ones, will be limited in numbers to approx 500, so do be quick to register and confirm your ticket (only $20!), as per the details on the brochure attached.  Peter is also joined by Steve Carpenter (refer bio attached).

Please feel free to circulate this important info on to friends and family.  Please note: Peter's new book, "Culture of The Kingdom" is very exciting and is a wonderful and gripping read, which he is also launching at this conference.  Don't miss this!

Blessings and sincere thanks,

Craig Beech

(for Carmel Friends Inc.)
0419 899 363

Palestinian Islamists are cleansing the Holy Land of Christians

From Cranmer Blog, Wednesday, June 12, 2013, by Simon McIlwaine (Anglican Friends of Israel Newsletter):        

Anglican Friends of Israel reflects on the significance of Hamas’s legislation which would mean the closure of Christian schools in Gaza, and urges Christian leaders in the West to start holding Palestinian leaders responsible for what happens to Christians under their jurisdiction.
 Last week the Catholic Herald reported that five Church Schools ("two Catholic and three Christian") are under threat in Gaza because of the ruling party Hamas’s intention to extend their Muslim Brotherhood-inspired version of Islam throughout their fiefdom. Their edict, which forbids the education of boys and girls together, will mean that the schools must close down because of lack of space and staff. That most of the students are Muslim matters not at all. What’s important is the segregation of male and female as far as possible.
 For some, this will be the first chill wind signalling what a Palestinian state dominated by Islamists will mean for Palestinian Christians. But such folk have missed warning signs going back many years.
 In 2005, the annual report on human rights abuses around the world produced by the US State Department recorded abuse of Palestinian Christians by individuals and by Palestinian institutions, such as government and the police. The report stated: 

The PA judiciary failed to adjudicate numerous cases of seizures of Christian-owned land in the Bethlehem area by criminal gangs. There were credible reports that PA security forces and judicial officials colluded with gang members to extort property illegally from Christians. Several attacks against Christians in Bethlehem went unaddressed by the PA, but authorities investigated attacks against Muslims in the same area.

About this time a Roman Catholic priest in Ramallah bewailed the fact that in his experience Muslim Palestinians did not want Christians living among them.
Then there are the attacks on Christians and their property by fellow Palestinians in both the West Bank and Gaza, few of which were reported by Western media outlets. Bible Society official Rami Ayyad was kidnapped and murdered by Jihadists in Gaza. The YMCA in the West Bank town of Qalqilya was torched, as were church schools in Gaza. 
The steady trickle of information about the harassment and persecution of Palestinian Christians by other Palestinians has increasingly come from Palestinians themselves, notably from the East Jerusalem-based Israeli-Arab journalist Khaled Abu Toameh. Abu Toameh risks his life to report various aspects of the underbelly of life under the Palestinian Authority. He reports on corruption within the PA leadership, the effects of chaotic and wasteful governance, and the way in which Palestinian leaders talk peace for eager Western ears whilst inciting their citizens (in Arabic) to believe that their Jewish neighbour can be eliminated.
Khaled Abu Toameh has covered the treatment experienced by Palestinian Christians in both the West Bank and Gaza extensively. He insists that the haemorrhage of Christians from the Holy Land is not due, as many would have us believe, to the Israeli ‘occupation’, but to their increasing marginalisation at the hands of neighbours who use their power to disadvantage Christians.
Then there is the increasing fear that Mahmoud Abbas’s weak Fatah regime in the West Bank could give way at any moment to a Hamas coup. If this happens – given Hamas’s previous record – it could well be the death-knell for Christianity in the Palestinian Territories. Only last week, Abbas permitted Muslim fundamentalists to strut down the streets of Ramallah. Why?
And now another source of information about the realities of life for Palestinian Christians is opening up. Palestinians from within the Territories are speaking out about the injustices that Palestinians are inflicting on other Palestinians. They do so at risk of their lives to whomever will listen.
One young Christian Palestinian woman – who had to flee her West Bank home because she dared to challenge the narrative that holds Israel responsible for all Palestinian woes – has spoken to audiences of all faiths and none in the UK and Europe about the unnecessary poverty and misery which years of mismanagement and corruption have brought to all Palestinians. She has also given accounts of the discrimination Palestinian Christians suffer at the hands of fellow Palestinians from both her own and her friends’ experience.
At a recent meeting in the Midlands, she told how, earlier this year, a student was beaten up by his classmates in a classroom in front of a teacher, with no action taken against the perpetrators. His crime? Refusing to give up his Christian faith and adopt Islam. She tells tales of the way in which she and other Christian students were sexually harassed by Muslim boys on their way to university because, unlike Muslim girls, they had to share public transport with the boys.
Even more chillingly, she reports how Palestinian Christian businessmen were murdered because they refused to pay the protection money demanded by what she described as the ‘Palestinian mafia’.
Though disturbing, the testimony of people like this young woman and journalist Khaled Abu Toameh is refreshing because it breaks a conspiracy of silence which has gone on for years. 

Many Palestinian Christians have claimed that their relations with their Muslim neighbours are nothing but cordial; that they are Palestinians first and foremost, united against their common (Jewish) foe. Yet the steady exodus of Palestinians from territories that are under the day-to-day control of other Palestinians suggests that something else is going on. 
Why Christian Palestinian leaders are unwilling to admit in public what they certainly acknowledge in private is unclear: fear of reprisals from their government, neighbours and even family must have some bearing on the situation. Nevertheless, this is a disaster for Christianity in the Palestinian Territories. As Abu Toameh comments: "By not talking openly about the problem, the Christian leaders are encouraging the perpetrators to continue their harassment and assaults against Christian families."
Nevertheless, Hamas’s action cannot be misunderstood by anyone. Respect for the views and culture of minorities such as Gaza’s Christians has no place in their thinking. Perhaps this is why it was reported by West Bank Christians and by Abu Toameh that

'Out of the 600 Christians from the Gaza Strip who arrived in the West Bank in the past two weeks to celebrate Christmas, dozens have asked to move to Israel because they no longer feel comfortable living under the Palestinian Authority and Hamas.’It is time for the churches in the West to stop fooling themselves and their congregations into believing that the horrifying reduction in numbers of Christians in the Middle East is somehow the fault of the Jewish State. The future for Christianity in the land of its birth is grim indeed as long as Western Christians avoid holding Palestinian leaders responsible for what happens to Palestinian Christians on their watch.

Syrian doctors violate BDS guidelines by sending gunshot victim to Israel for treatment

From the New York Jewish Week Editorial, 19 June 2013:
For pop singer Alicia Keys, who will soon visit Israel in defiance of a personal appeal to boycott from noted author Alice Walker, the decision to visit Israel, while worthy of our gratitude and applause, was made from a position of strength. After all, Keys is successful, confident and wealthy enough to do as she pleases.
On the other end of the spectrum is a Syrian doctor and his patient, 28, in the throes of a civil war whose decision to go to Israel was made in the ultimate weakness, with a bullet in his gut and life slipping away.
A few days ago, that doctor, who knew he could do no more to save his patient, pinned a handwritten note to his patient, whom he sent over the border to Israel: “Hello distinguished surgeon,” said the note, which explained the patient’s medical history. “Please...do what you think needs to be done and thanks in advance.”
The patient is now recovering in a hospital in Safed (in Israel).
According to the Times of Israel, the Israel Defense Forces has set up a field hospital near the border, where doctors have treated some 20 Syrians who were wounded in the civil war.
In one Syrian’s pocket the Israeli medics found a live hand grenade.
After the story of the Syrian with the note was reported, journalist Jeffrey Goldberg tweeted and tweaked the advocates of BDS (the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement):
“Syrian doctors violate BDS guidelines by sending gunshot victim to Israel for treatment.”
In a few days, critics of Israel will likely resume echoing Alice Walker, who compared Israel to an apartheid state, a place supposedly too evil for Alicia Keys to play, a place deserving of boycott and isolation. With far less publicity, Israel goes about the business of building a country that couldn’t be more different than its neighbor to the north.

Young Greens question Israel's right to exist

From the AJN, 20 June 3013, by GARETH NARUNSKY:

...the NSW Young Greens posted a poll on Facebook questioning whether the Jewish State should exist or not.

The poll, posted last Thursday – but which has since been taken down – asked users if they “believe that Israel has a right to exist”, to which they could select either “No, I believe in the rights and sovereignty of Palestine” or “Yes, I support the creation and continuance of the state of Israel”.

...a posting by the page admin in the comments stream under the poll stated that “the Greens is also not an authoritarian party. We are free to disagree with our party leader because it fosters debate. Leaders aren’t always right”.

... Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ) executive director Peter Wertheim said although Greens policy accepts Israel’s right to exist, “they continue to be embarrassed by extremists in their own ranks, including some of their MPs, who are fixated on singling out Israel, among all the nations of the world, as a target of hatred and demonisation”.

“Regardless of their personal views, their activities and rhetoric have time and again been magnets for gross expressions of anti-Semitism, both online and in public forums,” he said. “The Greens as a party have a choice to make … They can speak and act as a party with mainstream voter appeal, or they can pander to the radical fringe of politics. With a federal election fast approaching, they can no longer do both.”

An admin comment on the Facebook page attempted to justify the poll: “The main purpose of facebook questions is to illicite (sic) reponses (sic), debate and hopefully growth towards different viewpoints. The question is loaded, we acknowledge that but let me reiterate once again. this isn’t about jewish (sic) people. it’s about Israel.”

NSW Young Greens convenor Evan Gray told The AJN: “We posted a poll not to advocate policy but to encourage discussion – unfortunately the discussion we expected did not occur and so we removed the poll.”