Tuesday, 29 October 2024

 Katherine COPSEY (Southern Metropolitan) (13:24:074:): I move, by leave:

That this house:

(1)   notes that:

(a) the most recent reports from the United Nations state there have been 41,965 deaths and 97,590 people injured in Gaza, with 1.9 million people displaced, half of whom are children;

(b) on 26 September 2024, the Secretary-General of the United Nations, António Guterres, told a high-level ministerial meeting that the world has ‘failed the people of Gaza’ … ‘Two million Palestinians are now crammed into a space the size of the Shanghai international airport. Existing – not living, but existing – among lakes of sewage, piles of rubbish and mountains of rubble’;

(c) on the following day, 27 September 2024, the Secretary-General addressed the Security Council, saying ‘International humanitarian law must be respected. Civilians – and civilian infrastructure – must be protected. Aid must flow freely and safely. And there must finally be accountability. The key to peace in the region is a political solution. All hostages must be released immediately and unconditionally, and the international community must mobilize for an immediate ceasefire and the beginning of an irreversible process towards the end of the Occupation and the creation of a Palestinian State’;

(2)   does not support the state of Israel’s continued invasion of Gaza;

(3)   supports calls for an immediate and permanent ceasefire; and

(4)   calls on the Victorian government to advocate to the Australian federal government that it end its support for the state of Israel’s invasion of Gaza.

Leave refused.