“In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.”

Martin Luther King Jr.

On 16 May, Israeli Knesset member Tzippy Scott told a television audience, “We killed 100 Palestinians in Gaza tonight, no one in the world seems to care.” He was right. The Justice and Peace Office of the Sydney Catholic archdiocese cannot remain silent in the face of such normalisation of state violence. We cannot have our silence taken as consent for ethnic cleansing, famine and genocide.

We are calling on the newly elected Albanese Government to join with the Western leaders, Emmanuel Macron, Keir Starmer, and Mark Carney by signing the statement condemning it: This statement says in part…

“We strongly oppose the expansion of Israel’s military operations in Gaza. The level of human suffering in Gaza is intolerable. Yesterday’s announcement that Israel will allow a basic quantity of food into Gaza is wholly inadequate … We condemn the abhorrent language used recently by members of the Israeli Government, threatening that, in their despair at the destruction of Gaza, civilians will start to relocate. Permanent forced displacement is a breach of international humanitarian law…We will not stand by while the Netanyahu government pursues these egregious actions. If Israel does not cease the renewed military offensive and lift its restrictions on humanitarian aid, we will take further concrete actions in response,” as well as opposing “any attempt to expand settlements in the West Bank … We will not hesitate to take further action, including targeted sanctions”.

For the last 18 months the world — including Australia — has looked on as Israel’s action for the Hamas attack on 7 October 2023 went from retaliation and an attempt to recover the hostages to a clear military project of genocide.

More than 53,000 women, children and men have been killed by the IDF; in the last weeks babies, children have been dying of starvation – a famine induced by Israel’s refusal to allow relief trucks into Gaza

Just days after the election, Senator Penny Wong said, “A clear lesson from the election is that Australians don’t want political leaders to amplify overseas conflict for their own purposes… We may not be able to stop the conflict in Gaza from here, but we can make choices about how we deal with it here at home.”

She was right on both counts judging from the result of the election. But she was wrong to suggest that distance from the conflict should provide distance from a moral and ethical engagement and concern with the conflict.

We are not a big country and in geopolitical terms we are not a powerful country and none of that is relevant to our obligation to speak out against atrocities when we see them.

Australia must amplify our opposition to the genocide, starvation and ethnic cleansing being perpetrated by Israel against Palestinians today.

Finally, we of the Justice and Peace Office apologise for our silence. We have no excuse but — perhaps like millions of other Australians — we kept waiting for those in leadership to take the lead, for Israel to withdraw, for a ceasefire, for international treaty obligations to be respected. That day never arrived.

These are not excuses. There are no excuses. But in the absence of leadership and respect for our shared humanity, we say enough is enough. Australia must act to the full extent possible. That means sanctions, boycotting Israel’s products and ending the export of weapons parts to Israel via the US. This is where we start.

The views expressed in this article may or may not reflect those of Pearls and Irritations.