An illegal Israeli settlement in the West Bank. Labor has been criticised after Australia declined to join Britain, Canada and France in sanctioning imports from Israeli settlements. Photograph: Debbie Hill/UPI/ShutterstockView image in fullscreenAn illegal Israeli settlement in the West Bank. Labor has been criticised after Australia declined to join Britain, Canada and France in sanctioning imports from Israeli settlements. Photograph: Debbie Hill/UPI/ShutterstockLabor friends of Palestine criticise Australia’s decision not to join sanctions on Israeli settlements in West BankAustralia declined to join move by UK, Canada and France in banning trade with illegal Israeli settlements
Labor party members have criticised the federal government for not following the UK, Canada and France in banning trade with Israeli settlements in the West Bank, urging Penny Wong to mount a stronger response to violence against Palestinians.
The Labor Friends of Palestine group wrote to the foreign minister on Wednesday, calling for Australia to join a coordinated approach with allies and partners overseas, in line with changes to the party’s national platform agreed in July.
A campaign group within the party’s rank and file membership, Labor Friends of Palestine called for careful policy design, rather than “inaction,” including on how targeted trade restrictions could be implemented while protecting Palestinian workers and avoiding unintended consequences.
Read moreThis week, Wong confirmed Australia was preparing another round of sanctions against Israel, but stopped short of joining the UK in banning trade with Israeli settlements in the West Bank.
The UK foreign secretary, Ed Miliband, called efforts by Israel to control the territory unlawful and agreed there was “ethnic cleansing of Palestinians in areas of the West Bank, perpetrated by settler terrorists”.
Convenors of the group told Wong joining the new push led by the UK would be consistent with the principles endorsed by Labor members at the party’s national conference in Adelaide.
Labor’s platform, which is used to guide policy development, opposes the annexation of Palestinian territory and calls for Israel to bring illegal settlement activity and the occupation to an end.
It calls on the government to end any support being given to illegal settlement activity or extremist violence, and to implement further action and sanctions as necessary.
“The announcement by Canada, France and the United Kingdom provides Australia with an opportunity to give practical effect to those commitments,” the group said in a letter to Wong and provided to Guardian Australia.
“Australia has already worked alongside these countries in responding to escalating settler violence. In June, Australia joined Canada, France, Norway and the United Kingdom in coordinated sanctions and other measures against extremist settlers and those supporting violence against Palestinian civilians.”
The UK will ban goods from illegal settlements in the occupied territories, and introduce a new ban on arms licences and other exports. Sanctions against individuals are also planned but the plan could take six to nine months to be implemented.
In a joint statement, the UK prime minister, Andy Burnham, the French president, Emmanuel Macron, and Canada’s prime minister, Mark Carney, said they were taking further action to push for progress on a two-state solution.
Nine European countries also said they were considering similar measures.
While Australia has previously acted in concert with partners overseas, Wong said this week Australia was not currently pushing for a broad ban on goods produced in Israeli settlements.
She told the Senate on Thursday claims by the Greens that Australia was trying to placate the Netanyahu government were wrong.
“I think the Prime Minister Netanyahu’s government has made very, very clear their displeasure at the actions that the Albanese government has taken,” she said.
Greens senator Mehreen Faruqi challenged Wong to say if she agreed with Miliband that ethnic cleansing of Palestinians was taking place in the West Bank.
Instead Wong said Australia had “sanctioned Israeli extremists for the abhorrent settler violence terrorising Palestinian communities.”
Wong has been working with the family of the killed Australian aid worker Zomi Frankcom on a response to the Israel Defense Forces’ decision not to open a criminal investigation into Gaza strikes that killed her and six of her colleagues.
