High Court strikes down Commonwealth on long-detained refugees
Greg Barns

High Court strikes down Commonwealth on long-detained refugees

The High Court’s latest ruling on false imprisonment exposes the legal, financial and human consequences of Australia’s punitive immigration detention system, and the political refusal to abandon cruelty as policy.

The Israeli army's skewed scales of justice
Gideon Levy

The Israeli army's skewed scales of justice

Brigadier General Yisrael Shomer, head of the IDF Operations Division, has finally faced the consequences of his actions.

More room for dialogue with China in the Pacific region
Winston Mok

More room for dialogue with China in the Pacific region

As the US signals a move away from containment in the Pacific, China’s most strategic move would be to reorient Quad members towards their respective national interests.


Decolonising democracy – part five
John Keane

Reclaiming Democracy

Decolonising democracy – part five

In the fifth of an eight-part series, John Keane says the declining US empire will manage without democracy as it turns on its own citizens.

Why Pauline Hanson's biggest weakness is her newest voters
Kos Samaras

Why Pauline Hanson's biggest weakness is her newest voters

One Nation's surge is easiest to read as anger. It is better read through a different lens – gathering the Australians who formed their sense of who they are in an offline world, where belonging was anchored where they grew up.

AUKUS and the case for no submarines
Mike Gilligan

AUKUS and the case for no submarines

The case for AUKUS rests on treating submarines as essential to Australian sovereignty, while ignoring the broader defence capabilities that already protect Australia’s maritime approaches and raise serious questions about whether new submarines are needed at all.

Reform is hard, but Labor should hold its nerve
Chris Wallace

Reform is hard, but Labor should hold its nerve

The attacks on the government's budget reforms may be loud, but polling suggests voters are more open to tax change than the media backlash implies – and governments that want to deliver serious reform have to withstand the noise.


John Menadue

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Is re-nationalisation the answer to Australia’s energy transition?
Gary Moorhead

Is re-nationalisation the answer to Australia’s energy transition?

Australia’s renewable energy transition is being made more expensive by poor planning, fragmented market structures and ideological battles, when what is needed is a slower, more technically grounded assessment of how to keep the grid reliable and affordable.

Israel accounted for most civilian deaths from explosive weapons in 2025
Jessica Corbett

Israel accounted for most civilian deaths from explosive weapons in 2025

A new Explosive Weapons Monitor report finds civilians are continuing to bear the brunt of explosive weapons in populated areas, with Israel’s armed forces responsible for the majority of recorded civilian fatalities in 2025.

SpaceX is the new East India Company
Alessio Terzi, Stefano Marcuzzi

SpaceX is the new East India Company

As SpaceX prepares to list on the Nasdaq tomorrow in what could be the largest IPO in history, its rise raises a deeper question: how much sovereign power governments are prepared to allow a private company to accumulate in space.

The prison revolving door is costing lives
Jane Anderson, Kelvin Quartermaine

The prison revolving door is costing lives

For people caught in the revolving door of prison, the risk of suicide often extends beyond custody, exposing the failure of justice, health and housing systems to support life after release.

Trump goes shopping in the US Indian Ocean Island chain
Alison Broinowski

Trump goes shopping in the US Indian Ocean Island chain

President Trump is reportedly wanting to buy the Chagos Islands from Mauritius as his way of securing control of Diego Garcia. First, the United Kingdom must hand back their sovereignty.

Technology unravels strategy and the weakness of AUKUS
Derek Woolner, David Glynne Jones

Technology unravels strategy and the weakness of AUKUS

Developments in technology, their consequences for strategic policy and challenges in sustaining Australia’s submarine warfare capability are the ultimate challenges to AUKUS.

An open letter to the Minister for Home Affairs – Australia’s obligations to Palestinians must reach the visa system
Meg Schwarz

An open letter to the Minister for Home Affairs – Australia’s obligations to Palestinians must reach the visa system

In an open letter to the Minister for Home Affairs, Meg Schwarz argues that Australia’s obligations to Palestinians must be reflected not only in foreign policy statements, but in the practical systems that shape access to visas, scholarships and education.

Why are voters cranky enough to turn to Hanson? I have a theory
Ross Gittins

Why are voters cranky enough to turn to Hanson? I have a theory

One Nation’s polling surge reflects deeper disillusionment with the major parties, but the real test is whether Labor has the courage to press ahead with housing tax reform despite the inevitable scare campaign.

America cannot shoot its way out of decline
Robert Freeman

America cannot shoot its way out of decline

Donald Trump’s proposed $1.5 trillion Pentagon budget would not make the United States safer, but would divert resources from the education, infrastructure, research and resilience needed to rebuild national strength.

Air pollution in our cities is endangering health
Ben Elliston, Christopher M. Johnson

Air pollution in our cities is endangering health

Australians are too complacent about allowing diesel-run vehicles in urban areas. Diesel exhaust is carcinogenic and can cause other illnesses.

Decolonising democracy – part four
John Keane

Reclaiming Democracy

Decolonising democracy – part four

In the fourth of an eight-part series, John Keane shows how the fading American empire is resorting to military solutions for its mounting global ills, without winning.

Fifty years of ABC Classic and a nation still listening
Stewart Sweeney

Fifty years of ABC Classic and a nation still listening

ABC Classic’s fiftieth anniversary gives this year’s Classic 100 added resonance, celebrating not only great music but a shared cultural ritual that brings Australians together through listening.

The Kentucky colonel who drives Australian foreign policy
Kym Davey

The Kentucky colonel who drives Australian foreign policy

Australia’s foreign policy is being distorted by AUKUS, militarised thinking and a misplaced faith in US power, when the country should be rebuilding its diplomatic strength as an independent middle power.

If Support at Home is the answer, what is the problem?
Kathy Eagar, Susan Kurrie

If Support at Home is the answer, what is the problem?

Support at Home was meant to transform aged care, but its assessment and funding model has left older Australians waiting too long, paying too much and receiving services shaped by budgets rather than need.

Zia Ahmad’s OAM honours a lifetime of community journalism
John Mahoney

Zia Ahmad’s OAM honours a lifetime of community journalism

This week Zia Ahmad – a regular contributor to P&I – became the first Muslim to receive the Medal of the Order of Australia for services to journalism – and the second member of his family to receive the nation’s highest civilian honour.

One Nation’s Trumpian threat
Crispin Hull

One Nation’s Trumpian threat

One Nation’s polling surge could create serious instability after the next federal election, with the party’s growing Senate prospects threatening to disrupt the balance of power and test Australia’s political institutions.

John Menadue's book on Israel's war against Gaza

Israel's war against Gaza

Media coverage of the war in Gaza since October 2023 has spread a series of lies propagated by Israel and the United States. This publication presents information, analysis, clarification, views and perspectives largely unavailable in mainstream media in Australia and elsewhere.

Download the PDF

Latest letters to the editor

Military incompetence arises without trace

Richard Llewellyn — Colo Vale

This article illustrates that the old dictum that failing to understand the lessons of history predicates repeating it. In this case, students of military history will immediately recognise the same path that produced the ‘Dreadnought’ race that was – while not as much a tangible cause as geopolitical shifts of the time – still part of the combative ambience that created the First World War. ‘My ship is bigger/more lethal etc. than yours’ became what we now call a trope – a competition of no effect on the outcomes or the progress of the subsequent warfare. The prosaic artillery exchanges...
Yes, men did most of the destroying

Fiona Colin — Melbourne

Julian Cribb tackles another environmental disaster – desertification – from a gendered perspective: “Empowering women to manage the world’s lands is one of the few truly pragmatic steps that humanity can take to save our civilisation from devouring its own future.” Just before COVID, a small group of Melbourne climate activists (women and men) held our mini version of Fridays for Climate. Most passers-by were supportive or determinedly indifferent, but one was neither. He just yelled “Too many women”. Around that time, Jane Caro wrote: “As our planet heats up, we desperately need men to realise that it is not...
The unnoticed casualties of undersea progress

Alyssa Aleksanian — Hazelbrook

As global citizens, we have been fortunate to witness David Attenborough’s groundbreaking documentary Ocean. Australia has signed the treaty to preserve 30 per cent of our oceans. And yet alongside this, we are signing up to launch more military hardware into our oceans, continue to open areas to deep sea mining and green light fossil fuel drilling of sensitive reef systems along our coastline. One would have to be dimwitted indeed to think that all of this incredibly noisy destructive activity is not putting sea life, especially those acutely sensitive mammals, such as whales, dolphins and turtles under further threat....
Things run better under a benevolent dictatorship

Bob Pearce — Adelaide SA

The old saying remains true and the significant word is not dictatorship its benevolent. The feeling that we are all in this together is what, its not the system that is the driving force behind stability it's the benevolence, its the feeling that even if you're a little worse of than your neighbour if you work hard you will get there and your neighbour wont get in your way. Will help . .When you're struggling and you see the multi-million dollar wages and some of the mansions, luxury yachts and cars of others who pay little or no tax that...
Karmic justice in the polls?

John Leonard — Canberra

Although the recent eclipse of the Liberal-National Coalition ('the Liberal bloc' in Kos Samaras' article) by One Nation in the polls, and its defeat in the Farrer by-election, are extremely gratifying for those of us who believe that ‘what’s bad for the Liberal party is good for Australia’, I wonder if something more isn’t in play. Perhaps it might be karmic justice: after all the Liberal-National Coalition is the one party in history in a Westminster system that has participated in and benefitted from a coup d’état, and has never acknowledged this fact, or apologised for it. The illegality of...
Cuba and Haiti and the elites have never forgiven

Hal Duell — Alice Springs

It is depressing watching the US up the pressure on Cuba, but not surprising. That this is happening when the US Secretary of State is a self-styled Cuban refugee is also not surprising. But Cuba does not stand alone in the Caribbean crosshairs. Haiti has been there for years. The link between these two independent nations is that both achieved their independence by militarily overthrowing their western rulers. Haiti threw out the French two centuries ago, and Cuba tossed the US out half a century ago. Former slaves in the first case and descendants of former slaves in the second,...
Zionist Royal Commission

David Griffiths — Mordialloc VIC 3195

It is not surprising that the Royal Commission's primary interest is to reflect and reinforce the Zionist agenda - as it and Federal Labor are captive of the Zionist minority in Australia. The Interim Report is an example of this capture. The interim Report should have included an initial assessment of antisemitism - what it is and what it is not. It should also have included a summary of submissions received - and the differences that they reflect. But, the Royal Commission does not want to encourage debate about the meaning of antisemitism and the broader issue of free speech....
The deeper story

David Griffiths — Mordialloc VIC 3195

There is an even deeper issue as discussed by Peter Van Onselen in The Hollow State - Power Without Purpose in Australian Politics ( 2025) - an Australia of competing government managers that are devoid of values. He argues that the hollow state is dominated by tactics over strategy, image over integrity and short-term wins over long-term outcomes. The ALP and LNP are increasingly unable and unwilling to provide a believable vision and narrative and the consequence of this is that in despair increasing numbers of voters are tempted to support Reform in the UK and One Nation in Australia.