Q: I’ve listened to your speech and I’ve read it now through. Forgive me if I’ve missed it, but it appears to me there’s not a single mention in this speech of the crisis in Gaza. Given how much of the past 18 months has been dominated by that conversation – particularly from your party – that is surprising to me. Is that an example of you softening your position on Gaza, and is it recognition of how much it’s potentially damaged you on the Australian electorate?

(I don’t actually see how the Greens advocating against genocide and calling for lives to be saved has hurt them in the Australian electorate? There has been an increase of support for the Greens in some seats, including in Melbourne.)

Bandt:

I don’t agree with that assessment. When the attacks on October 7 took place and the hostages were taken and the killings happened, we condemned it. We condemned it at the time. We also said that, as an invasion loomed on 2.2 million people walled into an area half the size of Canberra, 40% of whom are under the age of 15, and they’ve got nowhere to go, it was going to be a slaughter.

And we are said that could not be backed.

And so we opposed, in parliament, the Labor and the Liberal backing of that invasion when they brought their motion to parliament. And it gives me absolutely no pleasure at all to see that, in the year plus since then, tragically, so many of the things that we warned about have to come to pass.

You now have tens of thousands of children who have been killed by an army and who have been separated from their parents.

Their healthcare system has been destroyed. People’s homes have been reduced to rubble. Amnesty International says there’s a genocide occurring. We’ve said that. If you don’t necessarily believe us, listen to Amnesty International.

There are now international courts that have issued arrest warrants for the extremist prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

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