Australia\u2019s Home Affairs minister says \u2018strength is not measured by how many people you can blow up\u2019.<\/p>\n
Australia has hit back at Israel\u2019s Benjamin Netanyahu after he branded the country\u2019s prime minister \u201cweak\u201d, with an Australian minister accusing the Israeli leader of conflating strength with killing people.<\/p>\n
In an interview with Australia\u2019s national broadcaster on Wednesday, Minister for Home Affairs Tony Burke said that strength was not measured \u201cby how many people you can blow up or how many children you can leave hungry\u201d.<\/p>\n
Burke\u2019s comments come after Netanyahu on Tuesday launched a blistering attack on Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese on social media, claiming he would be remembered by history as a \u201cweak politician who betrayed Israel and abandoned Australia\u2019s Jews\u201d.<\/p>\n
Speaking on the ABC\u2019s Radio National Breakfast programme, Burke characterised Netanyahu\u2019s broadside as part of Israel\u2019s \u201clashing out\u201d at countries that have moved to recognise a Palestinian state.<\/p>\n
\u201cStrength is much better measured by exactly what Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has done, which is when there\u2019s a decision that we know Israel won\u2019t like, he goes straight to Benjamin Netanyahu,\u201d Burke said.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe has the conversation, he says exactly what we\u2019re intending to do, and has the chance for the objections to be made person to person. And then having heard them, makes public announcement and then does what needs to be done.\u201d<\/p>\n
Relations between Australia and Israel, traditionally close allies, have progressively soured in recent months amid tensions over the war in Gaza, but ties have become especially acrimonious since Canberra\u2019s announcement last week that it would recognise a Palestinian state.<\/p>\n
On Monday, Australia announced that it had cancelled a visa for Simcha Rothman, a lawmaker with Israel\u2019s far-right Mafdal-Religious Zionism party and a member of Netanyahu\u2019s governing coalition, amid concerns that a planned speaking tour in the country aimed to \u201cspread division\u201d.<\/p>\n
Hours after that decision, Israeli Minister of Foreign Affairs Gideon Saar said he had revoked the visas of Australian diplomats to the Palestinian Authority.<\/p>\n
Israel has come under growing international pressure, including from many of its traditional allies, over the level of human suffering being inflicted by its war in Gaza.<\/p>\n
More than 62,000 Palestinians have been killed by Israel since it launched its military offensive following Hamas\u2019s October 7, 2023 attacks on Israeli communities, according to Gaza\u2019s Ministry of Health.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Australia\u2019s Home Affairs minister says \u2018strength is not measured by how many people you can blow up\u2019. Australia…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":160180,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[13214,4740,113,99,13191,50],"class_list":{"0":"post-160179","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-news","8":"tag-asia-pacific","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-conflict","11":"tag-israel","12":"tag-israel-palestine-conflict","13":"tag-news"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115059197577442950","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/160179","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=160179"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/160179\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/160180"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=160179"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=160179"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=160179"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}