The People Say, “Sanction Israel Now, Albanese”, Yet the Prime Minister Isn’t Listening

Pro-Palestinian activists descended upon the PM’s electoral office on Gadigal land in Marrickville on Monday, 10 June 2025 to protest Israel’s illegal commandeering of the Madleen, a UK-flagged civilian yacht bound for Gaza with aid supplies and a dozen crew members, but further, the protesters were calling on Anthony Albanese to take action in relation to the 20-month-long Gaza genocide.

Belonging to the Freedom Flotilla Coalition, the Madleen was carrying a crew of 12 well known activists, most prominently Sweden’s Greta Thunberg. And the yacht was illegally intercepted by the Israeli military 100 nautical miles off the coast of Gaza, and its crew were kidnapped by the Netanyahu government and taken to Israel.

The FCC confirmed that at 8.30 am Sydney time on Tuesday, the activists were being detained at Ben Gurion International Airport, awaiting deportation. And those captured had risked their lives, as Israel last month bombed a larger FFC ship bound for Gaza close to Malta, while in 2010, an FFC ship attempting to break the Gaza siege, was raided by the Israeli military and nine activists were killed.

The Madleen’s voyage was symbolic, drawing attention to Israel’s mass starvation project in the Gaza Strip. The taking of the yacht again sees Israel acting as a rogue state that does not honour international law but repeatedly tears it down to the detriment of the entire planet. And Israel has been systematically slaughtering and starving over 2 million Palestinians in the walled-in Gaza Strip.

The protesters gathered outside Albanese’s office on Monday, and those mobilised elsewhere across the nation, were ultimately calling on our government to act on the holocaust Israel has unleashed in Gaza. The people want Albanese to sanction Israel now. However, the PM has done nothing but show unbridled support for Tel Aviv in its extermination drive, and he’s lied about arms to Israel.

The new dystopian normal

“Civilians shouldn’t have to sail across the ocean to deliver aid,” Greens candidate for Grayndler Hannah Thomas told those gathered out front the office of the pollie she ran against in the recent election. “If people like Anthony Albanese, people with the power to stop this genocide, gave a shit about Palestinian lives or international law then we wouldn’t be living in this dystopian nightmare.”

“If people like Albanese cared, we would have had sanctions – real, debilitating sanctions against Israel. Sanctions that hurt. We would have sanctioned Israel into submission years ago,” she continued. “But instead, this monstrous regime continues to commit war crimes with absolute impunity.”

Israel began the heightened genocide its committing in Gaza in October 2023 – 20 months ago – with western powers lining up alongside Uncle Sam to deem the obvious mass slaughter of civilians, specifically because they’re Palestinians, as an act of self-defence.

And following the International Court of Justice ruling it a plausibly a genocide on 26 January 2024, Israel and its western allies have ignored the ruling and its implications.

Australia has stood by Israel throughout its long-extended massacre of Palestinian life. The Gaza Health Ministry puts the official death toll at around 54,600 on 4 June. However, in January, Al-Jazeera reported that The Strip’s population has decreased by around 160,000 people since October 2023, so the previously reported Gaza population of 2.3 million has dropped down to 2.1 million.

“In the last eight days alone, Israel has assassinated at least 102 desperate, starving Palestinians lining up for food,” Thomas further underscored. 

“I honestly can’t think of anything more cruel, sick and depraved than starving a population for months, then letting food in purely to use as bait to hunt.”

Settler colonial proclivities

Israeli troops killed 58 unarmed Palestinian protesters on 14 May 2018, as they were participating in the Great March of Return rally. Lasting for 20 months, the nonviolent protest along the Gaza border with Israel was notorious for the fact that Israeli snipers took out unarmed civilian protesters on regularly. A total of 223 Palestinians were killed. However, the 14 of May 2018 was the deadliest day.

A meeting of the UN Human Rights Council took place four days after the 14 May massacre to discuss the “deteriorating human rights situation in the occupied Palestinian territory”. Twenty nine nations voted for a special inquiry into the incident. Two voted against it: the US and Australia. Our nation noted that it considered “Israel had legitimate security concerns”, but it did regret the loss of life.

In the 2015 publication On Palestine, renowned US political dissident Noam Chomsky tells Israeli political dissident Ilan Pappé that the reason he considered Australia, Canada and the United States were the most consistent supporters of the Israeli regime is because all four nations are settler-colonial in nature.

So, Albanese’s unrestrained enthusiasm in supporting Israel’s mass bloodletting that commenced a week before the Indigenous voice to parliament referendum, wasn’t so surprising. However, the current Australian PM becoming the first western leader to be referred to the International Criminal Court for prosecution, specifically genocide complicity, was an unexpected development.

Sydney law firm Birchgrove Legal produced the accessorial liability for genocide claim, citing four instances in which Albanese stated support for Israel, which was expressing genocidal intent. This evidence has been added to the broader ICC State of Palestine inquiry, which has since issued an international arrest warrant against Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu, charging him with war crimes.

Three weeks ago, in response to the mass starvation program in the Gaza Strip and Israel’s expansion of military operations, the UK, France and Canada threatened sanctions against Israel, which was a significant development in the western response to Israeli actions. In stark contrast, however, Australia joined with other nations in calling for aid resumption with no mention of sanctions.

The joint statement by the UK, France and Canada further condemned Israel’s plan to permanently displace the Palestinians of Gaza and take it over, as “a breach of international humanitarian law”. It called upon the Netanyahu government to stop its military expansion in Gaza, to resume humanitarian aid into The Strip and to stop ongoing West Bank settlement expansion.

The three nations underscored that they would “take further concrete actions” if Israel does not halt its genocidal expansionism, and they added that they will not hesitate to take action, “including targeted sanctions”.

Yet Albanese finally did come to the table with words condemning Israel in terms of its mass starvation program on 26 May, but he skirted around another question regarding Israel’s declaration that it will be ethnically cleansing the entire Strip and permanently occupying the region.

“I made it very clear that Australia finds these actions completely unacceptable, and we find Israel’s excuses and explanations completely untenable and without credibility. People are starving, and the idea that a democratic state withholds supply is an outrage,” the PM told reporters. “Now, that is my clear position. It’s one I’ve indicated clearly and directly to the Israeli government.”

Yet, moments later, the PM returned to making statements denouncing the occupied Palestinians, in terms of Hamas, October 7 and the hostages. And as Anthony made his wishy-washy condemnation, while Canada had already taken a much more substantial step, it certainly gave the impression of Australia and the United States standing alone in continuing to support Israel’s mass crimes.

A moral duty to stop the killing

A large convergence of pro-Palestinians is expected on Ngunnawal Country in Canberra on 20 through to 22 July, to rally on the front lawns of Parliament House to make it directly known to the Albanese government that the people of this country want sanctions imposed on Israel immediately. And by that stage, the Gaza genocide will have continued for near on 22 months.

The Australian Centre for International Justice (ACIJ) called on our government to place targeted sanctions on specific Israeli ministers on 21 May, and it further raised the joint statement issued by the UK, Canada and France, which actually, for the first time, threatened actions that would serve to punish Israel economically, as well as specific officials personally.

“It is deeply regrettable that the Australian government did not join the statement or endorse its principled position,” the international law centre said. “Australia’s glaring absence signals a concerning lack of resolve. Australia has failed to uphold its international legal obligations to respond to Israel’s international crimes, including its obligations to prevent genocide.”

Article 1 of the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide states that all “contracting parties confirm that genocide, whether committed in time of peace or in time of war, is a crime under international law which they undertake to prevent and to punish”. Australia ratified the convention in 1949.

The ACIJ also outlined that sanctions can bring “some form of accountability”, and it stressed that Israeli officials “must not be immune from sanctions”. The legal centre too added that “Australia must move beyond statements of condemnation and limited designations to meaningfully hold senior decisionmakers accountable for serious human rights violations.”

“We need to keep the pressure on him and his government every single day,” Thomas said to the protesters gathered at the Australian prime minister’s office on Monday afternoon.

“That is our moral duty as a people living in a country that is complicit in this genocide.”