Australia’s Labor government has successfully passed a “hate speech” bill that’s plainly aimed, at least in part, at suppressing pro-Palestine organizations as “hate groups”.

Free speech advocates are sounding the alarm about the new laws, saying their extremely vague wording, lack of procedural fairness and low thresholds for implementation mean groups can now be banned if they make people feel unsafe or upset without ever actually posing any physical harm to anyone.

For me the most illuminating insight into what these laws are actually designed to do came up in an ABC interview with Attorney-General Michelle Rowland on Tuesday.

Over and over again throughout the interview Rowland was asked by ABC’s David Speers to clarify whether the new laws could see activist groups banned for criticising Israel and opposing its genocidal atrocities in a way that causes Jewish Australians to feel upset feelings, and she refused to rule out the possibility every single time.

Australia’s hate speech law            Video: ABC 7.30

“Let’s just go to what it means in practice: would a group be banned if it accuses Israel of genocide or apartheid, and as a result, Jewish Australians do feel intimidated?” Speers asked.

Rowland didn’t say no, instead saying “there are a number of other factors that would need to be satisfied there” and saying that agencies like the AFP and ASIO would need to make assessments of the situation.

“Okay, just coming back to the practical example though, if a group is suggesting that Israel is guilty of genocide, what other measures or factors would need to be met before they can be banned?” Speers asked.

“Under the provisions that are now before the Parliament, there would also need to be able to demonstrate that there are for example, some aspects of state laws that deal with racial vilification that have been met as well,” Rowland responded, again leaving the possibility wide open.

Australia’s frightening new ‘hate speech’ law         Video reading by Tim Foley

(It should here be noted that Greens justice spokesperson David Shoebridge has pointed out that “state laws that deal with racial vilification” can include “tests like ‘ridicule’ and ‘contempt’,” meaning people could wind up spending years in prison for associating with groups that were essentially banned for upsetting someone’s feelings.)

The only reason the Attorney General wouldn’t rule out the criminalisation of dissent and criticism of foreign countries and heads of state is if that’s exactly what Labor intends to cover here. pic.twitter.com/rV3e8TRB0l

— David Shoebridge (@DavidShoebridge) January 20, 2026

“Just to be clear, if a group is saying Israel is engaged in genocide, or they’re saying that Israel should no longer exist, that is not enough for that group to be banned?” asked Speers.

“Well, again, that would depend on the other evidence that is gathered, David, so I would be reluctant to be naming and ruling in and ruling out specific kinds of conduct that you are describing here,” Rowland replied.

All this waffling can be safely interpreted as a yes. Rowland is saying yes.

Speers pushed this question three different times from three different angles because it’s the most immediate and obvious concern about these new laws, and instead of reassuring the public that they can’t be used to target pro-Palestine groups and aren’t intended for that purpose, the nation’s Attorney General confirmed that it was indeed possible.

So that’s it then. Under the new laws we can expect to see the Israel lobby crying about Jewish Australians feeling threatened and unsafe by every pro-Palestine group under the sun, and then from there all it takes is the thumbs-up from ASIO to put the group on the banned list and cage anyone who continues associating with it for up to 15 years.

The bill that ended up making it through Parliament is actually a narrowed down version of an even scarier bill that was scrapped by Labor due to lack of support which went after individuals as well as groups.

The earlier version contained “racial vilification” components which could have been used to target any individual who voices criticisms of Israel or Zionism – so it doesn’t look like I’ll be doing any prison time for my writing any time soon. The new version moved its crosshairs to groups with the obvious intent to disrupt pro-Palestine organising in Australia.

And we’re already seeing the Israel lobby pushing to resurrect the laws targeting individuals. A new ABC article titled “Jewish leaders call for vilification offence to be revisited as Coalition splits over watered-down hate laws” cites Zionist Federation of Australia president Jeremy Leibler and Executive Council of Australian Jewry co-chief executive Peter Wertheim arguing that the new laws don’t go far enough.

So we can expect the Australian Israel lobby to both (A) push to get pro-Palestine groups classified as “hate groups” under the new laws and (B) keep pushing to make it illegal for individuals to criticize Israel in the form of new “racial vilification” laws.

They’ll keep trying over and over again, from government to government to government, until they get their way.

This comes after Australia/Israel and Jewish Affairs Council executive manager Joel Burnie publicly stated that he wants to ban pro-Palestine protests and criticism of Israel throughout the nation, and as prosecutors drag an Australian woman to court for an antisemitic hate crime because she accidentally butt-dialed a Jewish nutritionist and left a blank voicemail.

So things are already ugly, and they’re getting worse.

It’s so creepy knowing I share a country with people who want to destroy my right to normal political speech. It would never occur to me to try to kill Zionists’ right to free speech, but they very openly want to kill mine.

They want to permanently silence me and anyone like me. I find that profoundly disturbing.

Israel supporters are horrible people. And I hope my saying that hurts their feelings.

Caitlin Johnstone is an Australian independent journalist and poet. Her articles include The UN Torture Report On Assange Is An Indictment Of Our Entire Society. She publishes a website and Caitlin’s Newsletter. This article is republished with permission.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

A report by a media watchdog has revealed the United Kingdom’s media bias in covering the Hamas attack on October 7 and Israel’s five-month genocidal bombardment and ground assault in response.

“Much of the news coverage of 7 October refers to Hamas’s attacks on Southern Israel as ground zero, with guests or commentators who try and explain the 75-year-old occupation of Palestine being accused by some presenters and columnists as justifying the attacks,” the report by the Centre for Media Monitoring (CfMM) said.

By ignoring the context and history of the occupation of Palestine and Gaza in particular, the report said the media landscape had been “favourable to an Israeli narrative which has constantly promoted the attacks on Gaza and in the West Bank as a war between light and darkness”, reports Al Jazeera.

Titled “Media Bias Gaza 2023-24”, the report also called out treating the Israeli military as a “credible source” without subjecting it to further verification as “one of the glaring failures of journalists and media outlets”.

Difference in the use of language has also been a regular feature of coverage, the report says, with Palestinian deaths often underplayed compared with those of Israelis.

Pro-Palestinian voices and activists have been routinely denounced, misrepresented and targeted by many national media outlets, it says.

The report adds that the right-wing media have been particularly hostile towards pro-Palestinian voices, framing them as supporters of terrorism and anti-Semites as well as being hostile to British values.

Key findings include:

• Language use: Emotive language describes Israelis as victims of attacks 11 times more than Palestinians.
• Framing of events: Most TV channels overwhelmingly promote “Israel’s right” to defend itself, overshadowing Palestinian rights to defend itself and other rights by a ratio of 5 to 1.
• In broadcast TV, Israeli perspectives were referenced almost three times more than Palestinian ones.
• In online news, it was almost twice as much.
• Contextual framing: 76 percent of online articles frame the conflict as an “Israel-Hamas war,” while only 24 percent mention “Palestine/Palestinian,” indicating a lack of context.
• Misrepresentation and undermining: Pro-Palestinian voices face misrepresentation and vilification by media outlets, perpetuating harmful stereotypes.
  Right-wing news channels and right-wing British publications were at the forefront of misrepresenting pro-Palestinian protesters as antisemitic, violent or pro-Hamas.

At least 30,717 people have been killed and 72,156 wounded by Israeli attacks on Gaza since October 7, the Palestinian Health Ministry anounced.

The death toll from malnutrition and dehydration in Gaza has risen to 18.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

New Zealand has today reported nine new cases of covid-19 in the community and two in the country’s managed isolation and quarantine facilities while Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has warned the nation against “vilifying those who have caught the virus”.

Director-General of Health Ashley Bloomfield said there were eight people in hospital due to covid-19 – two in Auckland City, one in North Shore Hospital and five in Middlemore Hospital, including one in an intensive care unit (ICU).

An additional person in Waikato Hospital was hospitalised but not as a direct result of covid, Dr Bloomfield said.

READ MORE: Al Jazeera coronavirus live updates – France reports new post-lockdown record cases

Dr Bloomfield also confirmed that the St Lukes case had now been linked to larger cluster through genome tracing, and that the person may have been on the same bus with another case.

The possibility that the Rydges hotel maintenance worker caught the coronavirus from the lift was still being investigated.

One of the new imported cases is a female in her 30s who travelled from London via Hong Kong and arrived in NZ on 15 August, before becoming unwell on August 19.

The second is a male in his 50s who returned from Basrah via Dubai and Sydney between August 6 and 17. Both cases have been transferred to isolation facilities.

Church related
Of the nine new community cases, five were related to different churches in South Auckland and four were household contacts.

Dr Bloomfield said 88 of the 89 cases in the community are linked to the cluster and one is under investigation.

Today’s covid media conference. Video: RNZ News

Dr Bloomfield said there were 223 contacts from churches linked to the main cluster in this country – 170 tested, and further tracing would continue.

There were now 143 people linked to community cluster in quarantine, with positive tests. There were not a total of 1315 confirmed cases, including 105 active cases and 16 in managed isolation.

Dr Bloomfield said surge testing of border workers was nearly done – further testing in Auckland will start next week and then regular testing will begin.

Yesterday there were five new cases of Covid-19 in New Zealand, all relating to the existing Auckland cluster.

Vilifying ‘dangerous’
Cabinet met this morning to review the settings for the alert level restrictions throughout the country and Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said it will meet to decide the next steps in the plan – and the alert levels for Auckland and rest of country – on Monday.

Ardern said the range of the cluster had been identified and New Zealand was not dealing with multiple outbreaks – the majority of cases had already been contacted traced and put in isolation.

She said the country was getting in front of the virus.

The Prime Minister began her comments at today’s press conference by thanking those who had been tested.

“We would not have got in front of this cluster without them.

“Vilifying those who have caught the virus, or those who helped keep us safe by getting tested is something that I simply will not tolerate,” she said.

“It is those who shame others, those who seek to blame – they are the dangerous ones.

“They are the ones who cause people to hesitate before getting a test, they are the ones who make people feel afraid.”

She said New Zealanders needed to stick together, supporting each other and acting responsibly to defeat covid-19.

This article is republished by the Pacific Media Centre under a partnership agreement with RNZ.

• All RNZ coverage of covid-19
• If you have symptoms of the coronavirus, call the NZ Covid-19 Healthline on 0800 358 5453 (+64 9 358 5453 for international SIMs) or call your GP – don’t show up at a medical centre.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

by Dr Bryce Edwards

Debates over regulating free speech, hate speech, and the treatment of hate crimes are now in full swing. The Government and a number of state institutions had already been keen to bolster laws around hate speech and hate crimes before the Christchurch terrorist attacks. Therefore, it’s hardly a surprise to see an announcement that the Ministry of Justice and the Human Rights Commission are fast-tracking their attempts to pursue reform in these areas. 

The announcement was covered by RNZ in a news report on Saturday, Little plans fast-track review of hate speech laws. Here’s the key part: “Justice Minister Andrew Little says he’s fast-tracking a law review which could see hate crimes made a new legal offence. He said the current law on hate speech was not thorough and strong enough and needed to change. Mr Little said the Christchurch shootings highlighted the need for a better mechanism to deal with incidents of hate speech and other hateful deeds. He has asked justice officials to look at the laws and he was also fast-tracking a scheduled Human Rights Act review.”

According to this report, Little believes that the current Harmful Digital Communications Act doesn’t properly deal with the “evil and hateful things that we’re seeing online”, and other laws that deal with hate speech and discrimination are also inadequate.

Little is reportedly sensitive to the needs of free speech to be balanced against harms: “There will be important issues to debate. There will be issues about what limit should be put on freedom of expression and freedom of speech… We should reflect on where the lines need to be drawn and therefore, whether the laws should be struck so that they’re effective and provide some protection to people who’re otherwise vulnerable.”

Another news report explains that under current laws, crimes involving hate and discrimination are already factored into the judicial process as “hate-motivated hostility can be considered an ‘aggravating factor’ in sentencing, and staff can note when a crime was motivated by a ‘common characteristic’ such as race, gender identity, sexual orientation, or religion” – see Michelle Duff’s Hate crime law review fast-tracked following Christchurch mosque shootings.

But these processes are, according to Little, “woefully inadequate” and “Since the events of March 15, we are more conscious of the impact of what we are seeing and we need to do better”. Therefore, according to the article, a decision needs to be made about whether “hate crime should be established as its own separate offence, as it is in the United Kingdom.”

The article also raises the issue of whether Police collect enough data about the victims of crime, which might allow analysis to be made about the extent to which hate crimes are a problem. According to Duff, “Police have also told Stuff they will review their policy on the collection of ethnicity data. This is currently collected for all alleged perpetrators, but not routinely collected for victims.” And Little has responded to this prior lack of information gathering with surprise, saying “I would have thought it would be useful data to have.”

Calls for new hate laws have been supported by many. One Muslim leader has spoken out recently about the need for such laws – see 1News’ report about Canterbury University Muslim Students Association president Bariz Shah’s argument for new laws: “Ideally I’d love for the Prime Minister to say that they’re inacting a new law which basically charges anyone who says any hate speech to anybody, whether it be Muslim or non-Muslim… anything along those lines would be very reassuring” – see: Calls for new anti-hate speech law from Christchurch Muslim student leader.

Shah does however point to limitations with such laws and suggests other solutions are needed: “Obviously this is not a long term solution because people who have these types of ideologies they’ll just go in hiding and they won’t express themselves. So the long term solution would be to provide people with knowledge.”

Academic expert on ethnicity and extremist politics, Massey University’s Paul Spoonley, is also very supportive of the introduction of specific laws to outlaw hate. Talking to Newstalk ZB, he said, “I don’t think we can delay, because if you delay, then the changes of something else occurring like the events of last week might be a possibility” – see: Govt urged to introduce separate hate speech laws.

Spoonley has been very active in the debate on hate speech, and in another article is cited explaining that hate speech “provides an enabling environment which green lights racial and religious vilification”. He says it’s a problem because it “provides unfiltered ideas and arguments for those who are pliable and interested. And it tells others what you have done and got away with” – see Michael Andrew’s Online hate speech ‘gives green light’ to attacks.

In the same article, another academic, Camille Nakhid of AUT, is also quoted discussing what she sees as hate speech, which includes the concept that hate is intrinsic to our everyday life, saying “This country was founded on hate speech… I suppose they didn’t call it hate speech at the time, but the taking of Māori land, the denigration of people considered worthless, the marginalisation of their customs through laws and media, I’m still struggling to think why New Zealanders cannot see the correlation.”

In contrast, the article reports fellow AUT academic Paul Moon arguing that “while a desire for censorship was an instinctive response to hate-based events, it would not address the root cause of the problem”. He agrees that there is a need “to re-evaluate the limits of free speech in New Zealand”, but believes that “stifling speech could often create a dangerous climate of isolation” which could make things worse.

Moon says: “Censorship would be fruitless as a means of prevention because it addresses only a small part of the symptom, rather than the underlying cause.”

Opposition politicians are reacting with similar caution. Both the National and Act party leaders have been vocal this morning in pointing out that the problems of hate in society require a sophisticated response. Simon Bridges is backing Andrew Little’s plans to review the laws, saying “I think he is doing the right thing having a review” but emphasising that laws around speech and hate are “so fundamental to society that it can’t be rushed or fast-tracked” – see Jason Walls’ National Leader Simon Bridges backs hate speech review but warns against limiting free speech.

Bridges advocates that the Government “treads lightly on this”, because “Freedom of speech is so incredibly important to us as a society”, and “Where that line between free speech into that hateful and incitement of violence and the like is, is not easy”.

The same article quotes David Seymour on RNZ’s Morning Report, being even more alarmed by the Government’s plans, saying “When the Government makes it its role to start working out which opinions are right and which are wrong and which ones should be punished, that’s when you get into real difficulty”. Furthermore, according to Walls, Seymour argued that “a new hate crime law would exacerbate divisions and fail to stamp out prejudice in New Zealand”.

For more on Seymour’s views on hate crimes and hate speech regulation, as well as some background on the earlier debates on these matters in 2017, see Albert Redmore’s Act leader David Seymour says any possible hate crime laws would be divisive and ineffective.

Possibly the single best media item discussing the issue of hate speech and hate crimes is Sam Hurley’s Christchurch mosque shootings: Does New Zealand need hate speech laws after terror attacks? – which was published in the Herald prior to Andrew Little’s announcement.

The article is important because it provides detail on how the current laws work, and their inadequacies. Current legislation, such as the Human Rights Act, does in fact allow prosecutions – but the article points out that although it prohibits material that is “likely to excite hostility against or bring into contempt” against “people based on their colour, race, or ethnic or national origins”, “the law does not specifically mention discrimination based on religion, sexual orientation, gender or disability.”

Various cases are cited – such as the conviction in the 1970s of a man for “distributing a brochure around Auckland with a photo of Adolf Hitler and a quote from the Bible”, and then the failed High Court case against newspaper cartoons taken recently by Labour MP Louisa Wall.

Again, Paul Spoonley is quoted on the need for new hate crime laws to be balanced against political freedoms: “We need a severity test and of course that severity test shouldn’t be too low, we don’t want to infringe on free speech.”

University of Canterbury Law professor Ursula Cheer, who specialises in media, censorship, and political freedoms is also quoted, warning against a “knee-jerk reaction” of new laws, saying “I would rather the Government looked at what’s already there and decide whether any of that can be improved and made to work properly.” She’s against “over-criminalising society”, arguing that “You can’t reduce everyone in society to a child-like state.”

Cheer also points out that restrictions on speech in order to combat racism and hate, can actually have unintended consequences for politics: “You think [with hate speech laws] that you are getting people who might be an anti-Islamist … but you might also take in valid protest and discussion elsewhere.”

Finally, blogger David Farrar is also opposed to the establishment of specific hate crime laws that attempt to suppress hate speech, and points to a long list of disturbing outcomes from such laws in the UK, saying they are “a great example of how well intentioned laws end up criminalising many different types of speech” – see: Government looking to introduce hate speech laws.

By Michael Andrew

Religion and race-based attacks will continue as a result of the rise of online hate speech, says a leading New Zealand academic.

Professor Paul Spoonley, pro vice-chancellor of Massey University, told Asia Pacific Report that online hate speech “provides an enabling environment which green lights racial and religious vilification”.

He was responding to a media focus on racism and Islamophobia in news media this week, following last Friday’s massacre in which 50 people were killed by a right-wing terrorist.

READ MORE: Hate speech – we need to understand the damage it does

“It provides unfiltered ideas and arguments for those who are pliable and interested. And it tells others what you have done and got away with,” said Dr Spoonley, who gave a public lecture on the topic at the National Library on Tuesday.

Prior to the Christchurch attack, the accused terrorist was active on far-right online forums that promoted anti-Islamic sentiment.

-Partners-

In a recent article published by the Pacific Media Centre, Dr Spoonley wrote that he had personally encountered such hate speech.

Hateful comments
“I looked at what some New Zealanders were saying online. It did not take long to discover the presence of hateful and anti-Muslim comments.

“It would be wrong to characterise these views and comments as widespread, but New Zealand was certainly not exempt from Islamophobia.”

Recent research reports similar findings. According to a 2018 Netsafe survey of adult New Zealanders, 30 percent of participants had encountered online hate speech targeting someone else while 11 percent of all New Zealanders had been personally targeted themselves.

Religion was the most common reason for the abuse, followed closely by race and ethnicity.

While the internet has enabled such abuse to be shared more effectively, some argue that hate speech is an inherent issue in New Zealand society and has been since the days of early colonisation.

“This country was founded on hate speech,” said Associate Professor Camille Nakhid, an AUT sociologist and chair of the PMC advisory board.

“I suppose they didn’t call it hate speech at the time, but the taking of Maori land, the denigration of people considered worthless, the marginalisation of their customs through laws and media, I’m still struggling to think why New Zealanders cannot see the correlation.”

Racism unchecked
A researcher of marginalised and minority groups, Dr Nakhid said the attacks such as the mosque ones in Christchurch were an inevitable result of the racism that went unchecked in New Zealand society.

“We saw the danger of hate speech on Friday. If you look at what New Zealand media personalities have said about migrants and refugees, this is what it would lead to.”

There has been a number of recent controversies involving on-air racism, most notably when Newstalk ZB’s Heather du Plessis-Allan referred to Pacific countries as leeches.

In the wake of Friday’s massacre there has been a public outcry calling for the regulation and censorship of such speech in order to prevent further race and religion-based attacks.

However, AUT professor of history Paul Moon said that while a desire for censorship was an instinctive response to hate-based events, it would not address the root cause of the problem.

“Censorship would be fruitless as a means of prevention because it addresses only a small part of the symptom, rather than the underlying cause” he said.

“The problem of socially-conditioned hatred is so much larger and more intricate than the capacity of any sort of censorship to control it.”

Isolation dangerous
While he said that there was cause to re-evaluate the limits of free speech in New Zealand, stifling speech could often create a dangerous climate of isolation.

“What the Christchurch killer’s manifesto revealed was a profound degree of ignorance, isolation, and self-loathing,” he said.

“It was precisely a lack of exchange of ideas with the wider community that contributed to such a warped and manifestly dangerous view of the world.”

While the national grief has been palpable in the days following the massacre, the majority of the public has galvanised around New Zealand’s Muslim community, offering support, laying flowers at mosques and holding vigils of solidarity.

This, said Dr Moon, was the best way to counter hate speech.

“Participation, learning, and sharing are among the best antidotes to isolation, and the sort of hatred that can ferment from such social separation.”

Michael Andrew is the Pacific Media Centre’s Pacific Media Watch freedom project contributing editor.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz