Palestinian Struggle and Bondi Massacre |
During the Trojan War, the invulnerable Achilles was shot and killed by an arrow of Paris, which struck him on his only mortal heel. In a similar vein, a distant peaceful Australia- despite being involved in all the imperialist wars- hasn’t proven invincible. “Anyone who knows anything about Australian history will tell you that Australia was born out of a deep racist colonial thinking,” says Jewish Australian journalist, Antony Lowenstein “Just last week, figures came out that black deaths in custody- meaning Aboriginal people who die in police custody-are at the highest rate ever. So to suggest somehow that we are not a violent country, that somehow this is not Australia” Contrary to logic, those living in glasshouses brazenly throw stones at others because they consider themselves invincible. Yet stones can ricochet to shatter their own houses. History stands witness that capitalist wars of expansion destroy both victor and vanquished with democratic disregard. History follows its own course; it doesn’t help the victim, nor does it absolve the perpetrator. Children of violence sent to incinerate the world invariably come home to roost.
The Bondi Beach massacre has brought Australia into the limelight- not positively, but negatively. In a lone-wolf attack, a father and a son massacred sixteen people, including one of the attackers themselves. It was described as a targeted killing of Jews who had gathered to celebrate Hanukkah. No one knows the motive behind the savagery. But we live in times when motives are no longer defined; they are simply executed. More than 200,000 innocent civilians- according to The Lancet in October 2024-have been slaughtered in Gaza by the Zionist entity, with utter disregard for motive, although the motive is no secret.
Immediately after the carnage, the Police Commissioner described the gruesome act as terrorism. John Helmer, an Australian-born journalist, academic, and foreign correspondent, challenged this pronouncement by questioning the definition of terrorism. Citing New South Wales law, which follows the Federal Terrorism Police Act of 2002, Helmer explained that terrorism “means action done with the intention of advancing a political, religious or ideological cause and an action done with the intention of coercing or influencing by intimidation, the government of the Common Wealth or a state, territory, or foreign country, or intimidating the public or a........