The New Zealand Green Party co-leader suspended over criticising government MPs over a “spineless” stance over Gaza has called for action.

Greens co-leader Chlöe Swarbrick said in an interview with Al Jazeera that public pressure was mounting on governments to end the Israeli genocide in Gaza.

The politician continues to push for recognition of Palestinian statehood and sanctions on Israel, despite being ejected from New Zealand’s Parliament for a week for her remarks.

She refused to apologise in the House last week, telling Al Jazeera that New Zealand must “stand on the right side of history”.

“We in Aotearoa New Zealand have a long proud history of standing typically on the right side of things, whether that be our anti-nuclear stance or our stance against apartheid in South Africa,” she said.

“So it really is a question for this current government whether they are now willing to do the right thing and stand on the right side of history, and that was precisely the point that we were making last week in Parliament.”

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Protesters staged pro-Palestinian demonstrations across Aotearoa New Zealand at the weekend, calling on the government to place sanctions on Israel for its war on Gaza.

The government announced last week it was considering whether to join other countries like France, Canada and Australia in recognising Palestinian statehood at a United Nations leader’s meeting next month.

Demonstrators took to the streets in about 20 cities and towns on Saturday in a “National Day of Protest”, waving Palestinian and other flags, holding vigils, and banging pots and pans to represent what a UN-backed food security agency has called “the worst case scenario of famine”.

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“Grow a spine for Palestine!” was a frequent theme among about 5000 people protesting in the heart of New Zealand’s largest city today as the protesters demanded that the coalition government should recognise the state of Palestine and stop supporting impunity for Israel.

More than 62,000 people, mostly women and children, have been killed in Israel’s war on Gaza in the past 22 months and the country’s military have doubled down on their attacks on residential areas in the besieged enclave.

Several speakers, including opposition parliamentarians, spoke at the rally, strongly condemning Israel for its genocidal policies and crimes against humanity.

Many children took part in the rally at Te Komititanga Square and the return march up Queen Street in spite of the bitterly wet and cold weather. Many of them carried placards and Palestinian flags like their parents.

One young boy carried a placard declaring “Just a kid standing in front of his PM asking him to grow a heart and a spine”. The heart was illustrated as a Palestinian flag.

Other placards included slogans such as “Wanted MPs with a spine” and “Grow a spine for Palestine”, and “They try to bury us forgetting we are seeds” with the resistance watermelon symbol.

Many placards demanded sanctions and condemned Israel, saying “Gaza is starving. Words won’t feed them — sanction Israel now”, “NZ government: Your silence is complicity with Israeli genocide” and “Free Palestine now”.

Disillusionment with leaders
One poster expressed disillusionment with both the coalition government and opposition Labour Party leaders, Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Chris Hipkins, denouncing “apologists for genocide”.

Another poster challenged both Hipkins and Luxon over “what values” they stood for. It said:

“Our ‘leaders’ have refused to call for a ceasefire even after 10,000+ innocent civilians have been brutally murdered in their own homes, including 4000+ CHILDREN all under the name of “Kiwi values”.

“They, like a lot of other world politicians, are apologists for genocide.”

Frustration has been growing among the public with the government’s reluctance to declare support for Palestinian statehood after 96 consecutive weeks of protests organised by the Palestinian Solidarity Network Aotearoa (PSNA) and other groups, not just in the largest city of Auckland and the capital Wellington, but also in Christchurch and in at least 20 other towns and communities across the motu.

The “spine” theme in chants and posters followed just days after Parliament suspended Green Party co-leader Chlöe Swarbrick following a fiery speech about Gaza when she said government MPs should grow a spine and sanction Israel for its atrocities.

She had refused to apologise to the House and supporters at the rally today gave her rousing cheers in support of her defiance.

‘We need your help’
Te Pati Māori co-leader Debbie Ngarewa-Packer told the crowd: “We need you to help her put the pressure on so that we can fight together in that place [Parliament] for our people to free, free Palestine; from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.

“Return our dignity Aotearoa. Stand up for what is right. There is only one side to support in genocide, only one side. And Te Pati Māori will only work with those.”

When Swarbrick spoke to the crowd, she repeated her goal to find six government MPs “with a spine” to support her bill to “sanction Israel for its war crimes”.

She also said the Palestinian people were being “starved and slaughtered by Israel” in Gaza, adding that their breath was being “stolen from them” by the IDF (Israeli “Defence” Force).

“It is our duty, all human beings with breath left in our lungs, with the freedom to chant and to move and to demand action from our politicians, to do all that we can to fight for liberation for all peoples,” she said.

Other politicians speaking were Orini Kaipara, the Te Pati Māori candidate for the Tāmaki Mākaurau byelection, and Kerrin Leoni, mayoral candidate for Tamaki.

Targeted assassinations
Earlier, the targeted assassinations of six journalists by the Israeli military last Sunday — taking the toll to 272 — was condemned by independent journalist and Asia Pacific Report editor Dr David Robie. He also criticised the NZ media silence.

Noting that New Zealand journalists had not condemned the killings or held a vigil as the Media Alliance (MEAA) had done in Australia, he cited an Al Jazeera journalist, Hind Khoudary, whose message to the world was:

“We are being hunted and killed in Gaza while you watch in silence. For two years, your fellow journalists here have been slaughtered.

What did you do? Nothing.”

A recent poll on whether New Zealanders want sanctions to be imposed on Israel, showed that of those who gave an opinion, 60 percent favoured sanctions.

The PSNA commissioned survey by Talbot Mills in July with 1216 respondents gave a similar result to one commissioned by Justice for Palestine a year ago.

Popular support for sanctions
PSNA co-chair John Minto said the numbers showed strong popular support for sanctions. The 60 percent overall rose to 68 percent for the 18–29 year category.

“The government is well out of step with public opinion and ignores this message at its peril.  There is popular support for sanctions against Israel,” he said.

“People see that Israel is committing the worst atrocities of the 21st century with impunity. It is starving a whole population.

“It has destroyed just about every building in Gaza. It is assassinating journalists. It holds 7000 Palestinian hostages in its jails without charge.  Its goal of occupying all of Gaza and ethnically cleansing its people into the Sudan desert, is all public knowledge.”

Minto said Israel’s “depraved Prime Minister” who was wanted by the International Criminal Court (ICJ) for war crimes and crimes against humanity, had boasting that if Israel was really committing genocide, “it could have killed everyone in Gaza in a single afternoon”.

“The poll shows New Zealand First supporters are most opposed to sanctions against Israel (59 percent of those who gave an opinion were opposed) so it’s little surprise Winston Peters is dragging the chain.”

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New Zealand Green Party co-leader Chlöe Swarbrick has been ejected from Parliament’s debating chamber and told to leave for the rest of the week after a fiery speech about the war in Gaza.

The incident occured during an urgent debate this afternoon which was called after the coalition government’s announcement that it would come to a formal decision in September over whether to recognise the state of Palestine.

As Swarbrick came to the end of her contribution, she challenged coalition MPs to back her member’s bill allowing New Zealand to apply sanctions on Israel “for its war crimes”.

Green co-leader Chlöe Swarbrick asked to leave Parliament after Gaza speech   Video: Parliament TV

“If we find six of 68 government MPs with a spine, we can stand on the right side of history,” Swarbrick said.

Almost immediately, Speaker Gerry Brownlee condemned the remark as “completely unacceptable” and demanded she “withdraw it and apologise”.

Swarbrick shot back a curt — “no” — prompting Brownlee to order her out of the chamber for the remainder of the week.

“Happily,” Swarbrick said, as she rose to leave.

Green Party whip Ricardo Menéndez March later stood to question the severity of punishment, saying Parliament’s rules suggested Swarbrick should be barred for no more than a day.

Brownlee later clarified that Swarbrick could come back to the debating chamber on Wednesday, but only if she agreed to withdraw and apologise.

“If she doesn’t, then she’ll be leaving the House again,” he said.

“I’m not going to sit in this chair and tolerate a member standing on her feet . . .  and saying that other members of this House are spineless.”

‘What the hell is the point?’ — Swarbrick
Speaking outside the debating chamber, Swarbrick described the ruling as “ridiculous” and the punishment excessive.

“As far as the robust debate goes in that place, I think that was pretty mild in the context of the war crimes that are currently unfolding.”

She drew a comparison with comments made by former prime minister Sir John Key in 2015 when he challenged the opposition to “get some guts”.

Swarbrick said she was tired and angry at the massacre of human beings.

“What the hell is the point of everything that we do if the people in my place, in my job don’t do their job?” she said.

“If we allow other human beings to be just mercilessly slaughtered, to be shot while waiting for food aid, what hope is there for humanity?”

Swarbrick was not the only MP to run afoul of the Speaker during today’s debate.

Earlier, Labour MP Damien O’Connor was told to either exit the chamber or apologise after interjecting while Foreign Minister Winston Peters was speaking. O’Connor stood and left.

Brownlee also demanded ACT MP Simon Court say sorry — which he did — after Court accused Swarbrick of “hallucinating outrage”.

Government urges caution, opposition demands action
In his speech, Court said any recognition of a Palestinian state must be conditional on all Israeli hostages being returned and Hamas being disarmed and dismantled.

“Security must come before politics,” he said.

No National MPs spoke during the urgent debate.

Peters — who is also NZ First leader — told MPs the matter of Palestinian statehood was not a straightforward or clear-cut issue.

“There are strong opinions on both sides,” he said. “That is why we are approaching this issue carefully, judiciously and calmly.”

Peters also took umbrage with the opposition’s complaints, pointing out Labour never moved on the matter when it was in government.

In a 10 minute speech, Labour foreign affairs spokesperson Peeni Henare said New Zealand was being left behind as the coalition walked into a “sunset of denial”.

“How many more people will suffer and how many more people will die?”

‘Despicable’ justifications
Te Pāti Māori co-leader Debbie Ngarewa-Packer told MPs it was “despicable” to hear the justifications for another month’s delay.

“What will be left? Rubble? Martyred spirits? What is that you want to have left in a month’s time?” she said. “I have never been more ashamed to be in the House than I am today.”

In her speech, Swarbrick told MPs libraries of evidence demonstrated that the events unfolding in Palestine were “ethnic cleansing… apartheid [and]… genocide”.

“We are a laggard, we are an outlier,” she said. “We are one of the very few countries in the world who so far refuse to acknowledge the absolute bare minimum.”

Earlier, during Parliament’s Question Time, ACT leader and Deputy Prime Minister David Seymour objected to Swarbrick having a Palestinian scarf, or keffiyeh, draped across her seat.

“I invite you to consider what this House might look like if everybody who had an interest in a global conflict started adorning their seats with symbols of one side or another of a conflict,” he said.

“I think that would bring the House into disrepute and no member should be allowed to do such a thing.”

Brownlee said Seymour raised a good point, only for Swarbrick to then wrap the scarf around her neck.

“Oh, here we go,” he said. “Well, stay warm. We’ll move on now.”

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

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