Wednesday, 30 October 2024

 Aiv PUGLIELLI (North-Eastern Metropolitan) (09:53): I move, by leave:

That this house:

(1)   notes that since the Legislative Council’s resolution on 17 October 2023 concerning Israel and Gaza, which stated that this house ‘stands with Israel’, the following have occurred:

(a) Israel’s parliament has designated the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) as a terrorist organisation;

(b) Israel has further prohibited UNRWA from conducting any activity or providing any aid inside Israel;

(c) Israel’s decisions relating to the UNRWA oppose the United Nations charter and violate the state of Israel’s obligations under international law;

(d) Philippe Lazzarini, Commissioner-General of the UNRWA, has stated that this move will ‘increase the suffering of the Palestinians’ and is ‘nothing less than collective punishment’;

(2)   further notes that UNRWA is a vital United Nations body with a mandate to provide humanitarian assistance and protection to Palestinian refugees; and

(3)   calls on the Victorian government to advocate to the federal government to sanction the extremist Netanyahu government and to call for a permanent and lasting ceasefire.

Leave refused.