Tuesday, 5 March 2024

Middle East conflict

Katherine COPSEY (Southern Metropolitan) (13:37): I was proud to join the school strike for Palestine last Thursday. We marched through the streets with a diverse group of passionate young people, and the solidarity extended beyond those who were marching. There was spontaneous and real support from people passing by, with buskers joining in and accompanying the chants and people driving by honking their horns and holding up their fists in solidarity. A former director of Human Rights Watch has warned we are on the brink of ethnic cleansing in Gaza, and the UN has warned the Palestinian people are at grave risk of genocide.

In this place I call on the Victorian Labor government to be clear and transparent with the people of Victoria about their relationship with Israel’s Ministry of Defense, with whom the government quietly signed a memorandum of understanding in 2022, and with Elbit, the largest Israeli weapons manufacturer, which Victorian Labor gave funding to in 2020–21. Elbit’s weapons are killing children in Gaza right now, and Victorians deserve to know the details of what is being done in their name and with their taxpayer dollars. We need a permanent and lasting ceasefire now.