Australian PM rejects Netanyahu’s linking of Palestine recognition to Bondi Beach attack

Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese rejects Israeli counterpart Benjamin Netanyahu’s assertion that his government’s recognition of Palestinian statehood earlier this year “pours fuel” on an “antisemitic fire.”

Asked during an interview with the Australian Broadcasting Corporation if he saw a link between that action and the Bondi Beach terror attack, Albanese responds: “No I don’t.”

“And overwhelmingly, most of the world recognizes a two-state solution as being the way forward in the Middle East,” he adds.

Netanyahu also said yesterday that in an August letter, he’d urged Albanese to “replace weakness with action, appeasement with resolve,” but that the Australian leader had instead “replaced weakness with weakness and appeasement with more appeasement.”

Asked for his response to those comments, Albanese says his role “at this time is to bring the nation together, is to promote unity” and that the terrorists seek “to divide us as a nation, to pitch Australian against Australian.”

“We need to wrap our arms around members of the Jewish community who are going through an extraordinarily difficult period, not just those who are grieving loved ones and friends, but every member of the Jewish community in Australia,” he says. “This has been an extraordinarily traumatic 24 hours. My job is to provide support for the Jewish community, is to make it clear that Australians overwhelmingly stand with the Jewish community at this difficult time.”