Foreign Affairs Minister Penny Wong has claimed Labor’s historic election victory was in part due to its stance on Gaza, accusing both the Greens and the Coalition of spreading “false information to exploit legitimate concerns”.
In an interview with the Sydney Morning Herald, Wong claimed the election result proved Australians “don’t want political leaders to amplify overseas conflict for their own purposes as the Greens and Liberals did”.
“Both parties spread false information to exploit legitimate concerns,” she told the publication.
“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.”
Labor has pinned its electoral success, in part, as a vindication of a moderate policy when it comes to the contentious Middle East conflict.
Meanwhile, the Coalition accused the party of fuelling antisemitism in its votes against Israel at the United Nations in December last year, and the Greens accused the government of enabling a genocide in Gaza and providing weapons to Israel.
“We have to make the choice to stop attacking each other. The aggression and vitriol has to stop. The denigration of others needs to end,” Wong said.
Prior to this, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese also linked the Greens’ performance this election to its criticism of the government’s stance on the war in Gaza.
“Australians know that the Australian government is not responsible for what has occurred in the Middle East, and I think some of the opportunism that was there, that demonstration outside my electoral office turned off my local community,” he told Sky News on Thursday.
Greens’ outgoing leader Adam Bandt maintained that he was “proud to have raised [his] voice” for the Palestine as he conceded the seat of Melbourne.
“I’m proud to have raised my voice for the people of Palestine who are being decimated, and to have continued to call for a just and lasting peace for Palestinians and Israelis based on an end to the invasion and an end to the occupation,” he said in a statement conceding the loss to Labor candidate Sarah Witty.
The Australian Labor government has been criticised by pro-Palestine supporters of doing too little in the conflict, which has seen over 53,00 Palestinians — 80 per cent of which are estimated to be civilians — killed by Israelis since the October 7 attacks, according the Gaza Health Ministry.
Labor has repeatedly called for a ceasefire, while supporting Israel’s right to defend itself. More than 1,700 Israelis have been killed since October 7, also according to the Gaza Health Ministry.
The Albanese government angered Israel by voting in favour of United Nations resolutions demanding the nation end its presence in the occupied Palestinian territories as soon as possible, and calling for the evacuation of all settlers from the West Bank and Gaza.
It also rejected claims from the Greens that Australia was exporting weapons to Israel. No military equipment had been supplied to the country since the invasion of Gaza, Defence Minister Richard Marles stated.
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