IN THE MEDIA
Our historic ties with Israel can and must be rebuilt
August 22, 2025 | Colin Rubenstein
Daily Telegraph/ Courier Mail – 22 August 2025
Despite a relationship that stretches back to the ANZAC charge at Beersheba and Australia’s historic role in 1947 in helping broker Israel’s creation at the UN, the Australia-Israel relationship is now at an historic low. Inflammatory remarks by Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke on Wednesday followed an exasperated intervention by Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu the previous day. Meanwhile, Israel cancelled visas for Australian officials in retaliation for a pattern of similar hostile Australian actions, including excluding Israeli politicians on gratuitous grounds.
While this deterioration was sparked by a series of unwarranted and hostile actions by the Australian Government, both countries should now pause and reassess their actions. And part of that reassessment ought to acknowledge that the distancing of the Albanese Government from Israel pre-dates the war against Hamas in Gaza.
Australia has long taken pride in being among Israel’s earliest and most steadfast friends – from the ANZACs’ famous victory at Beersheba to HV Evatt’s decisive support for Israel’s establishment at the UN. That connection has not been just symbolic. Over decades, Israelis and Australians have worked together across defence, agriculture, medicine and science. Shared democratic values and common strategic interests have underpinned extensive military cooperation and intelligence sharing – cooperation that has helped prevent terrorist attacks on Australian soil. Australian farmers use Israeli water technology; Australian patients benefit from Israeli biomedical innovation. It is precisely because this relationship has been mutually beneficial – and strongly backed by the Australian public – that its current deterioration is so concerning.
Unfortunately, our Government has been walking away from a long-standing bipartisan consensus on our relationship with Jerusalem from almost the moment it was elected. It changed Australia’s votes at the UN, backing a number of one-sided anti-Israel resolutions, including one that purports to negate Israel’s legitimate historical and cultural claims in Jerusalem – a needless and ahistorical insult. It also abandoned Australia’s recognition that west Jerusalem is Israel’s capital, thereby having Australia deny just one country in the world – Israel – the right to choose its own capital on its own sovereign territory.
The Albanese Government even changed how it referred to the West Bank and Gaza, to the “occupied Palestinian territories”, thereby predetermining the outcome of the very final status negotiations Australia says it is committed to.
All of this happened before Hamas’ bloodthirsty attack on Israel in October 2023, and the subsequent Gaza war.
The length of the war and, in particular, the uncertainty of what a post-war Gaza would look like has certainly frustrated the Australian Government, as it has other Western governments.
Relations are especially strained at the moment because of the Government’s diplomatically misguided and counter-productive decision to extend recognition to a non-existent “State of Palestine”. Yet a Sydney Morning Herald poll found over three-quarters of Australians disagreed with that decision. Meanwhile, as US Secretary of State Marco Rubio has noted, the French-led recognition push helped torpedo a promising ceasefire deal only a few weeks ago.
However, the die is now cast, and it behoves both Canberra and Jerusalem to restore a constructive relationship. Political differences should once again be discussed one the basis of mutual respect, while every effort must be made to rebuild the long-standing and mutually beneficial ties between two proud democracies.
