Toya Adams and Laurie Shears describe attending the Sydney protest against President Herzog’s visit – and how police violence left them fearful, shocked and questioning Australia’s democratic foundations.

My husband and I are quiet conservative law abiding citizens in our 70s. Our limited interactions with police were positive leaving us a perspective police were solid public servants with arrests lawful and just.

I am a daughter of a British Colonel who fought Rommel in North Africa for five years during WWII, and that generations’ sacrifice to free Jews from internment, deliver western freedoms, Pastor Niemoller’s poem, and the phrase “Not in My Name” are instilled in my values. We felt compelled to attend Monday’s Sydney protest as we vehemently oppose our government’s complicity in Israel’s 80+ years of ethnic cleansing and war crimes against Middle Eastern peoples including the Palestinian genocide, and the violation of Australian laws and moral values.

Prime Minister Albanese’s invite of the divisive alleged war criminal Herzog seeks to normalise Israel’s litany of war crime atrocities. Our governments forced the agenda of a foreign pariah apartheid ethno-supremacist criminal state and a few powerful Zionists over the wishes of the bulk of Australians.

Herzog’s visit, evidenced by mass opposition, distresses millions of Australians including numerous non-Zionist Jews, plus Palestinian and Middle Eastern Australians – many here as their lands were stolen and loved ones murdered, possibly aided by Herzog’s incitement. Mass distress and destruction of social cohesion were always the predictable outcome.

Monday night shattered our perspective of Australia and our police force as we witnessed scenes with examples of unfettered police violence and sadism I never imagined possible by our countrymen. New South Wales went from a peaceful, kind, functional democracy to an authoritarian, violent, police state run by a pro-Zionist megalomanic intent on forcing his and a foreign criminal state’s will over Australian citizens in Australia irrespective of law. My feelings went from pride and safety to fear of police, shame, rage, and sadness.

Although I am now frightened of our police, as a feminist remembering that discrimination and many social injustices were reversed only by protests I feel compelled to protest to protect Australia’s implied civil common law rights to peaceful assembly and political expression. These are essential for a stable democracy and Australia’s envied inclusive multicultural secular peaceful law abiding culture and values.

PM Albanese and Premier Minns (along with others complicit with genocide) must leave positions of power for the good of Australia.