Published: 4 February 2026
Last updated: 4 February 2026
President Herzog’s visit might be useful if he could be persuaded to ponder the lessons Australia might offer.
When the six Australian states joined together in 1901 to become a new nation, there was no doubt that they conceived of Australia as a white country. First Nations Peoples were denied citizenship, and the centrepiece of immigration policy was the White Australia Policy.
Today, other than a few activists on the far right, that vision of Australia is rejected. In over a century our national identity has moved from a loyal outpost of Anglo Britain to a multicultural society, still struggling to find justice for its Indigenous peoples.
Nations evolve, and if they fail to adjust, they decline. Perhaps the Australian experience suggests that Zionism, conceived as creating a Jewish homeland, also needs to evolve.
Currently the lands of Israel/Palestine are occupied by roughly equal numbers of Jews and Palestinians, over whom Israel is determined to maintain total control. Australia, like many other countries has recognised Palestine, but it is increasingly apparent that Israel will not allow this and is using the expansion of Jewish settlements on the West Bank to make it less and less viable.
Just as we abandoned our national self-image of White Australia, any genuine solution requires Israeli Jews to abandon their idea of permanent supremacy
It is claimed that calls for freeing Palestine “from the river to the sea” are antisemitic because they imply wiping out the state of Israel. But it is equally problematic that there are many Israelis, including senior cabinet ministers, who echo this call in their claim to ‘Judea and Samaria’ (the West Bank) and even Gaza. They too want everything from Mediterranean to the Jordan, namely the entire area now controlled by Israel.