By Susana Suisuiki of RNZ Pacific

Original source: https://analysis1.mil-osi.com/2026/10/23/test-of-regionalism-pacific-churches-call-for-review-of-israels-pif-role/

Original source: https://analysis1.mil-osi.com/2026/10/22/new-caledonia-pro-independence-leaders-boycott-eu-critical-minerals-deal/

COMMENTARY: By Stefan Armbruster

Israel voted against all UN resolutions concerning decolonisation of the six Pacific territories at the UN General Assembly’s Fourth Committee (Decolonisation — C-24) meeting last week.

Decolonisation has been a founding principle of the Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) since its establishment in 1971.

The announcement by Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar that it has become a PIF partner on social media earlier this week has stirred controversy.

• READ MORE: Israel’s relationship with Pacific is ‘biblical, ageless, real’, says Fiji deputy PM
• NZ’s foreign policy obligation to confront Israel’s Gaza genocide
• ‘Please explain’, Palestine Forum tells NZ over Israeli-Pacific Islands Forum ‘partnership’
• ‘Serious questions to answer’ – Labour slams Luxon over Israel’s Pacific Islands Forum move
• Israel joins Pacific Islands Forum as development partner
• Other Gaza genocide reports

As well as voting against decolonisation on October 15, Israel — along with the US — were the only countries to oppose all resolutions at the Fourth Committee including:

• reporting obligations for administering powers;
• dissemination of decolonisation information;
• economic activities affecting territorial peoples;
• education and training opportunities; and
• implementation of the UN Declaration on decolonisation.

At the same meeting, the US explicitly called for the abolition of the UN Special Committee on Decolonisation’s mandate. Israel did not address the committee.

On October 20, Sa’ar posted on social media that the Pacific Islands Forum Secretary-General Baron Waqa had told him Pacific leaders accepted the country as a Forum Partner at PIFLM in Palau last month.

Another diplomatic achievement: Israel joins the Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) as a Forum Partner.

The Secretary General of the Pacific Islands Forum, Baron Divavesi Waqa, has informed me that Israel has been accepted as a Forum Partner, following a decision at the meeting of the Forum’s member state leaders in Palau.

This follows my visit to Fiji in June, where I met with the Secretary General and presented Israel’s request to join the Forum.

Strengthening ties with the Pacific Island nations is one of my objectives. Earlier this year, I opened Israel’s Embassy in Fiji, which also serves nine other Pacific Island nations, all friendly to Israel.
Under the current government, three of these countries, Papua New Guinea, Fiji and Nauru, have opened embassies in Jerusalem.

As a Forum Partner, Israel will participate in a framework for cooperation in areas of mutual interest, based on regional priorities and Israel’s expertise in water management, desalination, agriculture, tackling climate change, innovation and sustainable development.

Israel and the Forum will also develop a joint action plan setting out practical areas of cooperation and a mechanism to monitor progress.

— Gideon Sa’ar | גדעון סער (@gidonsaar) October 20, 2026

There was no mention of Israeli or any other country’s partner status in this year’s 55th PIFLM Communique and there has been no subsequent statement from the PIF secretariat.

On the PIF Review of the Regional Architecture and partner status, the Communique said, “leaders further agreed that the Secretary General would communicate the decision to Partners in line with the endorsed communication approach”.

PIF’s last status update on Israel was a meeting with ambassadors and its international aid agency Mashav on October 18, with no mention of its partner status.

“The criteria for PIF Dialogue Partners, which must be met by countries at the time of admission and then continuously adhered to, are:

• demonstratable commitment to advancing the vision and priorities of the Leaders of the Pacific Islands Forum;
• long-term forward commitment to the Pacific region as demonstrated through foreign policy commitments, engagement strategies, diplomatic missions and engagement with regional organisations, and transparency in declaring economic, political, and strategic interests in engaging in the region; and
• shared interests and common positions on international issues and a commitment to using global networks and membership of international organisations to support Forum priorities.”

Six of the 17 non-self governing territories on the UN decolonisation list are in the Pacific —  American Samoa, French Polynesia (Mā’ohi Nui), Guam, New Caledonia (Kanaky), Pitcairn and Tokelau.

Pacific leaders at PIFLM in 1981 passed a resolution “reaffirming their belief in the principles of self-determination and independence applying to non self-governing Pacific Island countries, including the French territories”.

In 1991, the PIF leaders Communique under the heading “Decolonisation” stated they “again reaffirmed the importance of the universal realisation of the right of peoples to self-determination in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations, and the principles and practices of the United Nations pertaining thereto.”

The UN recognises the Occupied Palestinian Territories (West Bank, East Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip) under the framework of belligerent occupation and international humanitarian law not the UN Special Committee on Decolonisation.

Stefan Armbruster is a freelance journalist covering Pacific regional issues.

• Video and transcript of the Fourth Committee meeting via UN Web TV.

Original source: https://analysis1.mil-osi.com/2026/10/22/israel-votes-against-decolonisation-for-pacific-at-un-then-says-it-has-become-pif-partner/

RNZ Pacific reporters

Original source: https://analysis1.mil-osi.com/2026/10/22/israels-relationship-with-pacific-is-biblical-ageless-real-says-fiji-deputy-pm/

COMMENTARY: By John Hobbs

New Zealand is failing its responsibilities towards the Palestinian people; a people who are dying from the actions of Israel.

Its responsibilities to hold Israel to account are laid out in the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, 1948. States are obliged to prevent and punish the commission of genocide.

This does not require that genocide actually occurs, the obligation is to act to prevent genocide. It is a prior obligation designed to ensure that genocide never exists.

• READ MORE: ‘Serious questions to answer’ – Labour slams Luxon over Israel’s Pacific Islands Forum move
• Gaza mass killing documentary a warning of global dystopian future — David Robie
• Other Gaza genocide reports

New Zealand’s lack of support for South Africa’s petition to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) accusing Israel of violating the Genocide Convention and its unwillingness to mirror the sanctions imposed on Russia following it’s invasion of Ukraine, are two examples of inaction.

New Zealand’s passivity reflects other influences, particularly those of the US.

Foreign Minister Winston Peters says as much in his recent speech to the NZ Institute of International Affairs: “An independent foreign policy can never be unidirectional. The left and a large section of the media, they define us acting independently only when we are disagreeing with the Americans.’’

New Zealand, and the US, unlike the UK, Canada and Australia, have not formally recognised the independent and sovereign State of Palestine. Peters curiously argues this reflects an expression of New Zealand’s independence, asserting this doesn’t foreclose alignments with countries such as the US.

Unquestioned alignment with US
New Zealand’s unquestioned alignment with the US is occurring in spite of US agreement to provide a $2.8 billion arms package to Israel.

A movie, now showing in New Zealand, American Doctor adds another dimension to the cruelty occurring in Gaza. It focuses on the work of three American doctors — Perlmutter (Jewish); Thaer Ahmad (Muslim of Palestinian descent); and Feroze Sidhwa (son of Zoroastrian parents.)

American Doctor – a new film.          Video: Democracy Now!

It is harrowing but essential viewing and brings an immediacy to the situation.

The suffering Perlmutter and his colleagues have seen in Gaza hospitals since Israel launched its retaliation for the October 2023 Hamas attack forms the core of the movie. The movie begins with the shredded bodies of tiny children lying on a medical bench – the result of US-made bombs employed by the IDF in Gaza.

The movie documents images of the Israeli military deliberately targeting civilians, hospitals, and hospital staff.

Dr Sidhwa comments:  “People feel like they have to have a PhD in this topic to understand it, or to discuss it sensibly. The question isn’t how well you know Arab-Israeli history.

“The question is: Do you or do you not support the murder of children? Do you or do you not support the torture of physicians? Do you or do you not support the bombing of hospitals?’’

Puzzling NZ not influenced by UK
It is puzzling that New Zealand has not been influenced by one of its closest allies, the UK, when its Foreign Secretary Edward Miliband, says: “The Palestinian people’s suffering is a stain on the conscience of the world. We call out ethnic cleansing by the settler terrorists in the West Bank.

“We call out the evidence of war crimes in Gaza. We call out Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestine.’’

Miliband accepts that the UK has a responsibility to do everything to end the occupation. Hence its decision to ban trade with all illegal settlements.

Such moves by the UK represent a sea change in the struggle to end Israel’s occupation and its programme of annexation of Palestinian land. New Zealand must be part of this change.

So what would a principled New Zealand foreign policy look like on Palestine?

It needs to be put on a firm foundation of the rule of law — stand with South Africa in its case against Israel at the ICJ, support the equal rights of Palestinians to self-determination with statehood recognition being a small step in this direction.

Impose sanctions against the State of Israel (not just against the illegal settler colonial settlements.) Scrutinise Israeli passport carrying arrivals into New Zealand to ensure they have not been part of the IDF acts in Gaza and the the West Bank.

Foreign policy isn’t something New Zealand voters prioritise.

Shameful NZ record on Gaza
New Zealand’s shameful record on Gaza, however, should be top of mind going into the election.

While the government has failed in its response to the horror of Gaza, undermining our standing in the international community, three political parties — Greens, Labour, and Te Pāti Māori — are articulating an approach to Palestine grounded in a morally defensible foreign policy.

All support statehood recognition of Palestine, the imposition of sanctions on Israel and joining South Africa at the ICJ. Labour will require the NZ Superfund and ACC to divest from holdings in companies on the UN list of companies operating in the Occupied Territories.

Whatever shape the next government takes it must shift its approach to one which upholds international law and supports the people of Palestine as their survival in their homeland is in peril.

New Zealanders and our political parties must act and be part of the global momentum to end the brutality in Gaza, to reverse the illegal occupation of the West Bank, support Palestinian self-determination and hold Israel to account.

To do otherwise represents a moral failure as citizens of Aotearoa New Zealand and it will severely damage our reputation among many of our traditional allies, trading partners, and the international community.

John Hobbs is a doctoral student at the National Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies, University of Otago. This article was first published by the Otago Daily Times and is republished with the author’s permission.

Original source: https://analysis1.mil-osi.com/2026/10/21/nzs-foreign-policy-obligation-to-confront-israels-gaza-genocide/

Asia Pacific Report

A leading Palestine advocacy group in New Zealand has given the government a “please explain” message after news reports that the Pacific islands Forum (PIF), the region’s main political body, have admitted Israel as a sectoral partner.

According to 1News, the decision was made under a new two-tier partnership model, with Israel engaging at ministerial rather than leaders’ level.

The Forum Secretariat had not publicly announced the decision when the report was published.

• READ MORE: ‘Serious questions to answer’ – Labour slams Luxon over Israel’s Pacific Islands Forum move
• Israel approved as second-tier partner in Pacific Islands Forum
• Israel joins Pacific Islands Forum as development partner
• Other Israel and the Pacific reports

New Zealand, along with Australia, is one of 18 members of the Forum and will host next year’s Leaders’ Summit.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is wanted on an International Criminal Court (ICC) arrest warrant for war crimes and crimes against humanity, and Tel Aviv is widely condemned for its genocide in the besieged Palestinian enclave of Gaza with at least 75,000 people killed.

Both Netanyahu and New Zealand Prime Minister Christopher Luxon face elections within the next few weeks.

Four questions
Palestine Forum chair of New Zealand Maher Nazzal has called on Luxon and Foreign Minister Winston Peters to answer four questions:

• What position did New Zealand take on Israel’s application?;
• What advice did the Government receive on the diplomatic, legal and human rights implications?;
• Did New Zealand raise Israel’s conduct in Gaza and the occupied Palestinian territories during its consideration?; and
• What safeguards will ensure the partnership does not undermine the Forum’s commitments to human rights, peace and self-determination?

“These are reasonable questions, and New Zealanders are entitled to clear, public answers,” Nazzal said.

“Cooperation cannot replace accountability.”

Israel has signalled interest in cooperating with Pacific states on water, agriculture, climate adaptation and innovation.

“These matter to Pacific communities. But technical cooperation must not shield any state from scrutiny under international law,” Nazzal said.

‘Consistent principles’
“PFNZ respects the sovereign right of Pacific nations to make their own diplomatic decisions. Our concern is not with the people of Israel, or with cooperation that genuinely benefits the Pacific.

“It is with consistent principles and meaningful accountability, whichever state is involved.”

Nazzal said Pacific peoples understood what land, identity and self-determination meant. That was why the Palestinian experience of displacement and occupation resonated across the region.

“PFNZ urges the government to show that its commitment to a rules-based order applies consistently, and encourages Pacific civil society and communities across Aotearoa to engage in informed discussion,” he said.

“The question is not only who may join a regional forum. It is whether the principles that guide that forum are upheld consistently.”

Original source: https://analysis1.mil-osi.com/2026/10/21/please-explain-palestine-forum-tells-nz-over-israeli-pacific-islands-forum-partnership/

By Kaya Selby of RNZ Pacific

New Zealand Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has “serious questions to answer” over Israel becoming a partner of the region’s main political decision-making institution, Labour’s foreign affairs spokesperson says.

Israel has joined the Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) as a development partner, the Israeli Foreign Ministry announced in a statement on Wednesday.

A number of Pacific governments have been forging closer ties with Israel’s government at the same time that its standing in the international community has dropped to a new low.

• READ MORE: Israel joins Pacific Islands Forum as development partner
• Other Israel and the Pacific reports

The Israeli government has been widely accused of violating international law with its devastating military attack on Gaza and attacks on four other Middle Eastern countries over the past two years.

Luxon stated earlier this month that his Israel counterpart Benjamin Netanyahu would be arrested if he came to New Zealand, after the International Criminal Court’s recent decision to issue arrest warrants for Netanyahu and others in his cabinet.

He said Israel’s entry to the PIF ecosystem was ultimately a decision for the Forum, but noted its partnership status would be “lower tier”.

The New Zealand leader attended the meeting in Palau last month when PIF leaders decided to recognise Israel as a new partner.

‘Warm Pacific welcome’
ACT leader David Seymour extended “a warm Pacific welcome” to Israel after it was accepted as a partner state.

“Another democratic country in the Pacific Islands Forum is a good thing — possibly a bit geographically challenged. But then we’ve had Britain try and join the Trans-Pacific Partnership, so it seems geography is no barrier these days.”

However, Labour’s foreign affairs spokesperson Vanushi Walters said if her party were in government, it would have opposed Israel’s inclusion in the PIF.

“Christopher Luxon has said that he would arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu if he came to New Zealand,” she said.

“He has serious questions to answer on how this situation has come about and what steps New Zealand took to object.”

New Zealand has issued a travel ban targeting some Israeli leaders. But in terms of who from Israel would be attending the PIF summit in New Zealand next year, Luxon said it was more on an official level, rather than leader level.

Tel Aviv has stepped up its diplomatic focus on the Pacific over the last few years, gaining support from a number of Pacific countries in the process.

With its new PIF status, Israel will be obliged to engage actively with the region on development priorities in the areas such as water management, desalination, agriculture and climate change adaptation.

“Israel will participate in the Forum’s Sectoral Partnership Stream, enabling focused cooperation in areas of mutual interest,” the Israeli Foreign Ministry said.

It also referred to a more wide-ranging agreement between Israel and the PIF that would set out key goals, and a mechanism to measure their progress.

The PIF Secretariat itself has not issued a formal statement.

In recent times, three Pacific countries have announced they would open embassies in Jerusalem — Papua New Guinea, Fiji and Naoero, and other Pacific nations are considering following suit.

They are among just a handful of countries that recognise Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, in spite of the United Nations Security Council Resolution 478 and subsequent international consensus that foreign embassies in Jerusalem are considered a violation of international law.

Samoan government released a statement last night highlighting Prime Minister La’aulialemalietoa (La’auli) Leuatea Schmidt’s reflections from his past visit. La’auli wants to open the embassy as soon as possible and they are looking forward to it.

“The Prime Minister spoke about some of his greatest memories in Israel and one is when he was walking through the old city and seeing an abundance of fruits used to make juice which he said was amazing,” the Samoan government said in a statement on Tuesday night.

A play for recognition
Sione Tekiteki, a former PIF advisor and now law lecturer at Auckland University of Technology (AUT), told RNZ’s Midday Report that Israel was seeking to use the Pacific as a means of legitimising itself — using the affection it has won in the region.

“They are obviously tied. The strategic aspect here is gaining formal recognition through the Forum, which elevates it’s status beyond bilateral relationships,” he said.

In June, Fiji hammered out an agreement for Israel to open an embassy in Suva, which would service nine Pacific countries.

Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar, who is subject to multiple complaints at the ICC in relation to Gaza, landed in Fiji last June, and was welcomed by Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka — who himself was deployed in the Golan Heights in his military days.

Rabuka, while sharing a kava bowl with Sa’ar, told him “we will always be with you”.

Most recently, Naoero opened a Jerusalem embassy within days of withdrawing from the ICC. Its government boasted about its record of voting in tow with Israel at the United Nations.

Most recently, Naoero opened a Jerusalem embassy within days of withdrawing from the ICC, a move applauded by the Trump administration.

The Naoero government press office has not responded to questions on whether this decision had to do with active ICC charges laid against Israeli leaders.

How will Israel participate in the Pacific?
Tekiteki said in the decision to grant membership — made in Palau at last month’s PIF leaders summit — partners were considered in their totality, “as opposed to having specific conversations around specific countries”.

The nature of Israel’s diplomacy in the region has been described by Israel officials as a “sharing of expertise”, rather than a traditional aid relationship.

Israeli firms have established themselves in several Pacific countries, and Pacific nationals are provided opportunities to travel to Israel to study and work.

Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Sharren Haskel told RNZ Pacific last year that they do not measure their friendship with the region by the amount spend on aid — which is relatively minor.

“Israel is not a major economical power that has a lot of money to spend, especially during times of war,” she said, adding that Israel had no plans to increase support in monetary terms.

“It’s not about the amount of money that we can invest but the quality and the things and how it affects the people.”

Haskel visited Papua New Guinea and Fiji a year ago. Her country agreed to provide for cybersecurity services in Fiji, with representatives from defence contractor Elbit, also part of her visiting delegation.

On the same trip, Haskel suggested that Fiji could deploy army personnel to the Gaza strip, where it is currently carrying out a devastating long-term military campaign against Palestinians.

This came before a formal request by the United States to Fiji in December for troops to join a UN-authorised International Stabilisation Force in Gaza — which Fiji has given no formal response to.

As for PIF itself, Tekieki said New Zealand, as next year’s hosts, would have to make some hard decisions around Israel’s participation.

“Israel is a sectoral partner … it is still unclear whether, moving forward, sectoral partners would be invited into the PIF leaders meeting, or whether those dialogues would be held at ministerial level.”

Original source: https://analysis1.mil-osi.com/2026/10/21/serious-questions-to-answer-labour-slams-luxon-over-israels-pacific-islands-forum-move/

By Kaya Selby of RNZ Pacific

This story was first published on

Original source: https://analysis1.mil-osi.com/2026/10/21/israel-joins-pacific-islands-forum-as-development-partner/

Wendy Bacon investigates the Israel lobbyists, PR people and astroturfers behind the Combat Antisemitism Movement targeting local councils and the Bondi Royal Commission. Michael West Media.

INVESTIGATION: By Wendy Bacon

Australia’s Commonwealth and NSW governments are supporting a national local government conference organised by the Combat Antisemitism Movement (CAM), whose Israel-based CEO was head of the IDF’s social media unit.

The IDF is widely accused of war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide by international bodies such as the United Nations, human rights organisations, and legal investigators.

The key goal of CAM, which operates in 40 countries, is to enforce the IHRA (International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance) definition of antisemitism across all fields and levels of government;

a definition which restricts criticism of Israel.

• READ MORE: Other Wendy Bacon reports
• Other Bondi Royal Commission reports

CAM’s global headquarters are in Kansas, with CEO Sacha Roytman running the show from Tel Aviv. Chairman of its board of advisors, Natan Sharansky, was Deputy Prime Minister of Israel.

In a submission to the Royal Commission into Antisemitism and Social Cohesion, Roytman accused this publication of attacks on the CAM Summit and its organisers, among other unsubstantiated claims and imputations of antisemitism.

The submission went on to claim that “the publications that attacked the event” did not contact CAM beforehand.

This is false. In line with standard journalistic procedure, Michael West Media tried to contact CAM on multiple occasions and sent questions prior to publication of the story to its chief executive, Sacha Roytman, which received no response. Here are the questions:

MWM also tried to contact CAM organiser Justine Williams by LinkedIn and another organiser by phone on more than one occasion.

Further, we also endeavoured to contact chairman of the board of advisers, David Gonski, who is co-chairing this year’s conference. Having been directed to UNSW Media for a response, we sent questions to UNSW Media and UNSW Media did not respond.

The lead author of CAM’s submission to the Royal Commission is Sacha Roytman — a Belgian communications expert who made Aliyah to Israel in 2004.

The second author is Israeli Yigal Nissel, who is currently CAM’s executive director in Australia. In 2015, he was sent to Australia as an”’emissary” for the Jewish National Fund (JNF Australia). He returned to Israel and has been working for the Israeli Ministry of Diaspora Affairs and Antisemitism’s Mosaic Project until he returned to Australia to work for CAM.

Planning for the last Australian CAM conference became public in January 2025 when the then Deputy CEO of CAM, Yigal Nissel, published a story, “From Paradise to Peril,” in the Jerusalem Post, stating,

“Thousands of [Australian] extremists, spanning the radical left, the far right, and parts of the Muslim community, seized on the conflict in the Middle East as a pretext to unleash their latent antisemitism.”

As reported here last year, Nissel, who was based in Israel, announced that a CAM conference of hundreds of mayors would address the problem. Previously, Nissel was the Israeli “emissary” to the Australian branch of the Jewish National Fund (JNF).

Envoy Jillian Segal to co-host
The conference will kick off with messages of support from the Commonwealth and NSW governments. The first speaker is Alex Ryvchin, co-CEO of the Executive Council of Australia Jewry (ECAJ), who labelled thousands of Australians who marched for Palestine last weekend as “obsessive, extreme and hateful”.

The conference follows the initial CAM Local Mayors’ Summit held on the Gold Coast last September. This year’s event will be held in Sydney on November 26 and 27 at a location that has not been publicised.

It will be co-hosted by the Special Envoy to Combat Antisemitism Jillian Segal and delivered in partnership with Waverley Council.

This week Segal addressed a meeting of the global network of Special Envoys supported by the World Jewish Congress calling for the enforcement of her National Plan at an international legal. CAM is a “trusted US State Department partner” within the Special Envoy network.

Pro-Israel conference sponsors include ECAJ, the Dor Foundation and the NSW Jewish Board of Deputies, which last week received a grant of $100,000 from the NSW government to contribute to the conference.

Sheina Gutnick, whose father died in the Bondi massacre, was appointed CAM’s public affairs officer in March and since then has been the public face of CAM. She told the Royal Commission into Antisemitism and Social Cohesion that she has been the victim of many antisemitic attacks since then.

Labor backing council campaign
Recently, she has been collecting supportive videos from councillors and MPs, including the federal Minister for Local Government Kirsty McBain, who urged CAM to “take back Bondi”. McBain is not attending the conference.

Two Labor mayors, the Inner West’s Darcy Byrne and Bayside’s Christina Curry, are speaking at the conference. Lord Mayor Clover Moore will not attend, which is scarcely surprising given that CAM organised a rally at which Moore was attacked as a terrorist sympathiser because she joined last year’s March for Humanity.

The City of Sydney told MWM that the Labor Deputy Mayor Ollie Arkins will attend. While it presents a bipartisan image, CAM is being driven, both internationally and in Australia, by some influential conservative Zionists with a right wing agenda.

The players behind CAM
CAM Australia claims that its activities are funded by its Australian partners but MWM has been unable to find any business name, company or charity which accounts for its finances. There is a board of CAM Australia which is chaired by the hugely influential businessman David Gonski.

We sent questions to CAM including asking which entity the board governed but got no acknowledgement or reply.

Gonski is close to Jillian Segal and heads the Special Envoy’s Education task-force. He was recruited to CAM by Yigal Nissel who was moved to CAM from his job at the Israeli Ministry for Diaspora Affairs and Antisemitism and sent to Australia to help organise CAM’s first conference. He was dispatched back to Australia this year to head CAM in Australia.

Alex Polson is CAM’s senior advisor. He was originally a national officer of the Australasian Union of Jewish students. After that for eight years he was an advisor to Liberal ministers and MPs.

PRs, astroturfers and lobbyists
In early 2024, Polson established his boutique advisory and investment company DBK. DBK registered the name Better Councils and Polson was the key Liberal organiser of the major parties’ “Put the Greens Last” astroturfing campaign for “Better Councils”, and its successor for the Federal election “Better Australia”. (ALP member Sophie Calland was the Labor end of Better Australia.)

Bipartisan Better Australia raised at least $1.3 million (with no donors disclosed) much of which must have been spent on its slick electoral materials. For this, Better Australia partnered with strategic communications company Agenda C.

Agenda C was established by strategist Carrington Brigham in 2019. Earlier, Brigham developed his skills working under Yaron Finkelstein at Crosby Textor, known for its role in conservative electoral wins in Australia and the United Kingdom.

Finkelstein was a founding member of NSW Liberal Friends of Israel and played a powerful role in the Morrison government as the PM’s personal private secretary. After the Coalition defeat in 2024, Finkelstein worked for NSW Premier Dominic Perrotet and then founded Society Advisory Pty Ltd, which has been granted a $200,000 contract to advise Special Envoy Jillilan Segal until April 2027.

Trickery claims
Polson and Brigham worked together on the  Better Australia campaign. Finkelstein attended a meeting where campaign materials and a detailed campaign strategy were discussed with Labor party members of Better Australia. Everyone listed as present was a committed pro-Israel Zionist — but the campaign messages were

“Don’t be Tricked by Teals” and “Put the Greens Last”.

Agenda C claimed its campaign successfully defended four major seats and won back another four.

Brigham celebrated when his friend Tim Wilson narrowly defeated Teal Zoe Daniel in Goldstein after his campaign branded her as untrustworthy.

With the success of Better Australia behind them, Alex Polson and his DBK consultancy again linked up with Brigham and Agenda C for the CAM’s first conference. Polson and Brigham both signed the media release for the conference, along with a PR person in the US.

Agenda C aimed to deliver a “fully integrated, multi-channel strategy that positioned the summit as a credible, necessary platform for national leadership.”

Agenda C and CAM continue to work together, partnering on exclusive polling for The Sunday Telegraph about levels of fear in Australia, which was featured in a piece promoting the CAM conference.

CAM’s political agenda
The 2026 conference programme promotes CAM as being all about interfaith, inclusive and sharing cultural approaches. Everyone is expected to commit to goals in the final session.

There are no speakers from Jewish, Palestinian or other human rights organisations that favour broad anti-racism strategies and do not accept that anti-Zionism is a form of antisemitism (unlike CAM).

CAM’s actual political agenda is clarified in its submission to the Royal Commission into Antisemitism and Social Cohesion, which was published on the commission’s website in mid-September.

The CAM submission has four authors — the first is CEO Roytman and the second is CAM’s Australia CEO Nissel. Nowhere is it mentioned that Roytman is in Israel or that Nissel is on leave from an organisation that partners with the Israeli state. The other authors are Polson and Gutnick.

Despite their “grassroots” talk, CAM’s agenda is a top down one.

CAM wants the Royal Commission to recommend training police to enforce IHRA as it is doing in several US states where CAM trains police in “evolving forms of antisemitism”.

It favours passing laws which prohibit posting online material viewed by CAM as antisemitic. It wants a National Local Government Partnership Against Antisemitism and for Social Cohesion, delivered through Australian Local Government Association LGAs built on CAM’s Action Plan’s four pillars.

Even by Zionist standards, CAM’s version of IHRA is wide. A symbols document that they distributed to conference attendees last year is attached to their submission. It takes in everyday symbols like “keffiyehs” and “watermelons” and a broad range of pro-Palestinian slogans.

In the submission, CAM attacks union and activist campaigners who wrote letters (including one to Darcy Byrne signed by 700 people) urging a boycott of last year’s conference.

They accuse them of intimidation, harassment and antisemitism — for example by referring to a Zionist Lobby or Israeli propaganda. It asks the Royal Commission to conclude that the albeit peaceful action of critics demonstrates the need for a Commission into Antisemitism and Social Cohesion.

Peace protesters ‘to blame’
CAM blames peaceful protesters for costing them thousands of dollars and forcing them to bring in a counter-terrorism squad.

One of these protesters was Jewish anti-Zionist Veronica Sherman. Sherman told MWM that she was one of about five people who “travelled independently from around Australia to protest outside the conference …

“nothing about us could be described as intimidating.”

“Even the cops told me how surprised they were at how few protestors there were because they had been told there would be hundreds if not thousands. Which explained why there was such a heavy police presence. Including helicopters,” she said.

Protesting is a “basic Australian and democratic right. It’s important that Australians know that the Zionists don’t represent all Jews which is one of the reasons I flew up to hold a banner peacefully outside the venue”.

Pressure and complaints
Recently Polson exercised his democratic right to write on behalf of CAM to the organiser of an event at the University of Tasmania at which Nick Hanna, co-founder of the Civil Defence Legal Centre and lawyer at Hanna Legal was delivering the keynote address.

CAM claimed that Hanna had produced an antisemitic video and asked the university to reconsider its invitation. The university rejected CAM’s argument and said the event would go ahead. Hobart Synagogue, which is supporting the CAM conference, then wrote a letter complaining that while Hanna sounds “calm and reasonable” he is “extremely dangerous” for its Jewish community.

In releasing his video about this behind the scenes pressure, Hanna says it showed that people can resist pressure and win.

Polson has high hopes for the November conference, hoping that it will “scale a national movement already underway”.

But MWM hears applications to attend the conference, which this year costs $600 without accommodation, are slow — and a new campaign to discourage councillors from attending has just begun.

Detailed questions for this story were put to CAM, Polson and Waverley Council but we received no reply or acknowledgement.

Original source: https://analysis1.mil-osi.com/2026/10/20/israelis-mislead-australias-royal-commission-into-antisemitism/

Asia Pacific Report

The New Zealand government must turn concern for besieged Palestinians into urgent, practical action, says a Palestinian advocacy group.

The Palestine Forum of New Zealand has called on the government to take “immediate diplomatic and financial action” following the UN World Food Programme’s announcement that 500,000 Palestinians in Gaza will lose their monthly food assistance because of lack of funds.

“This is not an abstract budget issue. It is a decision that will affect the daily survival of hundreds of thousands of people who have endured years of war, displacement, destruction and deprivation,” said Palestine Forum chair Maher Nazzal in a statement.

• READ MORE: Gaza malnutrition and starvation at ‘catastrophic’ levels: Health Ministry
• Other Gaza genocide reports

He said the World Food Programme had warned that its assistance was being severely reduced just as winter approached.

“Food rations are being halved, cash assistance is being cut, and the provision of hot meals is being reduced,” he said.

Meanwhile, about 1.4 million people in Gaza continue to face crisis-level food insecurity or worse.

“No family should be left wondering where their next meal will come from because the international community has failed to fund humanitarian assistance,” Nazzal said.

What the Palestine Forum seeks
The Palestine Forum of New Zealand has called on the New Zealand government to:

• Provide urgent additional humanitarian funding for the World Food Programme and trusted humanitarian organisations delivering food, clean water, medical care and essential supplies to Palestinians in Gaza;
• Mobilise international support by working with like-minded governments to close the WFP’s funding gap and ensure that humanitarian assistance is sustained rather than progressively reduced;
• Use New Zealand’s diplomatic influence to press Israel to ensure the safe, rapid and sustained entry and distribution of sufficient humanitarian aid throughout Gaza, without arbitrary restrictions or obstruction;
• Demand full implementation of the ceasefire and protection of civilians, alongside compliance with international humanitarian law and the removal of barriers preventing Palestinians from accessing essential supplies; and
• Adopt a sustained humanitarian response, with transparent commitments and regular public reporting on New Zealand’s contributions and diplomatic efforts to address the crisis in Gaza and the occupied Palestinian territory.

“New Zealand cannot resolve this crisis alone, but it can make a meaningful contribution,” said Nazzal. “It can provide funding, mobilise other countries and use its diplomatic relationships to press for action.

He said the international community must not “allow a fragile improvement in food security to be reversed because humanitarian funding has fallen short”.

Humanitarian assistance needed to be based on need, “not donor fatigue or shifting political attention”.

“Palestinians in Gaza are not statistics. They are human beings, families, children and older people who deserve food, safety and dignity,” Nazzal said.

Original source: https://analysis1.mil-osi.com/2026/10/20/palestine-forum-calls-for-nz-action-as-500000-palestinians-in-gaza-face-winter-food-aid-cuts/

Exposing autocracy from military-ruled Fiji to democratic Samoa, journalist Shalveen Chand has faced cell blocks, state censorship and physical assaults for holding Pacific powers accountable. Now joining the Cook Islands News as senior journalist, Chand brings a relentless commitment to press freedom, warning that democracy collapses when watchdogs are silenced.

COMMENTARY: By Shalveen Chand

I have encountered two types of dictators in the Pacific. The first was in my home nation when a military leader overthrew the government at gunpoint and ruled with an iron fist, his rule spanning from 2006 to 2014.

The second is a democratically elected leader whose rule highlighted the blatant lack of accountability and transparency. His grab for power literally defines the phrase “absolute power absolutely corrupts”.

There is definitely a difference in how Fiji’s Voreqe Bainimarama and Samoa’s Laaulialemalietoa Leuatea Schmidt have come to be in power, but what makes them similar is the blatant disregard for accountability and transparency — the “my way or the highway” attitude — sacking of people who do not agree with their goals, disregard for the rule of law and, above all, media censorship and attacks on journalists.

• READ MORE: RSF calls on Samoan PM to lift ‘unacceptable’ ban on Samoa Observer
• Other Shalveen Chand media freedom reports

Bainimarama was clear and deliberate about restricting media freedom. He set up censors in newsrooms who would stop the publishing of articles that would be deemed anti-government and later enacted the draconian media law that governed media in Fiji.

That law, repealed in 2023 by the current Fijian government, led to the persecution of journalists and the self-censorship mentality that is still practised in some newsrooms in the country.

Laauli, on the other hand, made a promising start when he was elected prime minister in Samoa in September 2025. In his first press conference, he made a promise to be transparent and accountable. A promise that he never intended to keep, which has now resulted in the banning of Samoa’s only independent publication, Samoa Observer, from government events, government officials not being accountable to the media, bullying and assault on journalists, including on me in front of his house.

This intimidation was among the reasons I left Samoa and my job there to join Cook Islands News as a senior journalist.

Serious breaches
There have been serious breaches of due process, including in top-level government appointments. It is worrying when merit is no longer a requirement to hold a top civil service position. Nepotism is rife, and his own children are acting as if the nation were the family business.

This was seen a few weeks ago when Laauli’s son snatched a camera off a reporter and deleted photos, saying it was against the law to photograph his father. Last time it was checked, no such laws existed.

While Bainimarama used guns and the might of the military, Laauli uses a new tool: social media. Fake accounts carry out his propaganda and target journalists and their families with attacks. My toddler and wife have often been victims of these attacks, even though my spouse’s political allegiance is with Laauli.

Yes, she’s Samoan, and she occasionally reminds me of how “Sleeping with the Enemy” can be viewed in a whole new context. But I am thankful that despite being critical of the media, she has always stood up for me whenever I have been targeted, either physically or on social media.

People have approached and questioned me on why I was against their prime minister. It is hard to make some people understand that it was no personal attack on the leader but a journalistic attempt to keep him honest, accountable and transparent. Many times, these physical confrontations have been met with my personal bodyguard, my wife, willing to throw a few combinations like David Tua.

Similar attacks have been levelled against journalists who were part of the newsroom I managed in Samoa. Their families and children were targeted and sometimes maligned to their worst.

One of the things that sadden me the most is how the rule of law has been compromised in Samoa. Corruption was already rife; however, when you add in a leader who believes he is above the law, the rule of law starts becoming non-existent. The Australian Broadcasting Corporation has dubbed Laauli as the “Trump of the Pacific”, and his behaviour often mirrors that of the American president.

Judiciary independent
Thankfully, one of the arms of the Samoan government, the judiciary, remains uncorrupted and has stood as the final wall in the attack against the rule of law, media freedom and the rights of citizens.

However, the judiciary is powerless when the enforcement agency does not do its work. Such was the case when I was assaulted outside Laauli’s house by a relative of his. A police complaint filed on 14 November 2025, the day of the incident, has not moved forward because the police officers who witnessed the assault do not want to give a statement for fear of retribution or losing their jobs.

I clearly remember the attack. The demeanour of the prime minister’s relative and his henchman gave away what they were going to do next as they rushed outside to where I was standing on the roadside. I came to drop off a camera lens for my journalist, who was trying to get comments from Laauli. The newly elected Samoan leader had just spent several weeks in New Zealand on a medical trip without communicating with the people of Samoa after photoshopped images of him were published by the Samoan government.

The two men rushed towards me. Their body language and aggression had been something that I had experienced during Fiji media’s dark days when the nation was under the control of the military junta. The haunting assaults and bullying by the security forces, and then having to spend a few nights in a police cell for highlighting a miscarriage of justice, came rushing back.

I braced for impact and told myself not to retaliate. The relative of the prime minister shoved me twice, trying to force me into my car. This was followed by him pushing the car door at least three times in my face. While he carried on, his short and fat henchman, probably another relative of the prime minister, held me by the collar and threw a few slaps.

A police officer aided the two relatives as well, shoving me into the car while throwing punches to my abdomen. All this was witnessed by at least six other police officers, my young journalist and a senior travel writer from the British Broadcasting Corporation. The words of the journalists were not enough to lead to any formal charges — instead, the young journalist was charged with criminal trespass.

This was the start of Laauli’s restriction on free and independent media who were trying to hold him accountable and get him to talk. This has now led to the continued ban on Samoa Observer and attacks on its journalists.

Many hoodwinked
It was also surprising that there were people who still support the Samoan leader’s actions. Many are hoodwinked by the social media propaganda. This was reflected when Samoa slumped to 59 out of 180 in the Reporters Without Borders’ World Press Freedom Index.

There are still a lot of people who do not realise that freedom of the press is a right and that a government should not interfere with this freedom or censor media critical of state power. For years, freedom of the press has been an essential part of democracy. A democracy cannot exist when people’s voices are stifled.

A free press fights for the truth, whether it is Fiji, Samoa or the Cook Islands. A free press uncovers the truth. A free press holds power accountable.

Many entities can benefit from the truth staying hidden, including governments. One of the free press’ main missions is to serve as a watchdog on power. The press is the bridge between the people and powerful entities. If the press is not free but instead beholden to power, it simply serves as an extension of that power.

As I begin a new chapter with the Cook Islands News, I hope that the weight currently being accorded to media freedom and accountability in this nation only improves. This is one of the best ways a government can serve its people.

Shalveen Chand is a former editor of the Samoa Observer and now works for Cook Islands News as senior journalist. This article is republished from the CIN with permission.

Original source: https://analysis1.mil-osi.com/2026/10/19/holding-power-accountable-a-pacific-journalists-journey-through-assaults-and-censorship/

By Kelvin Anthony of RNZ Pacific

Fiji’s constitutional reform process has brought the question of who is or can be a “Fijian” back to the fore.

Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka’s coalition government has begun the public consultation process on the Constitutional (Amendment) Bill 2026 in its efforts to replace the 2013 Constitution — a document widely criticised as being imposed on the country by the previous Bainimarama administration.

Public consultations on Rabuka’s bill started last week, two days after the country marked its 56th independence anniversary. It was tabled by the government earlier this month and passed its second reading for the Fijian people to give their feedback.

• READ MORE: ‘Respect the people’ – Fiji coalition clash over Rabuka’s fast-tracked constitutional referendum
• Other Fiji constitution reports

However, the consultations last week spotlighted why ethnic anxieties remain one of the most sensitive issues in the country, even four coups and four constitutions later.

Local media widely reported on submissions made by ordinary Fijian citizens as well as community and national leaders.

A large cross-section of society remains divided about who should be called a “Fijian”, as well as the role of traditional chiefs in Fiji’s governance and politics and whether Fiji should be a Christian or secular state.

These three pillars are the defining features of the 2013 Constitution, but also remain issues that were not debated during the FijiFirst administration’s time in power.

Equal national identity
One prominent political figure with a minor party declared that the iTaukei (Indigenous) people faced a “technical genocide” because Voreqe Bainimarama’s government created an equal national identity which made all citizens “Fijians”.

Some want the Great Council of Chiefs (or the Bose Levu Vakaturaga) — another Indigenous institution that was removed by Bainimarama and has no constitutional legitimacy under the current constitution — to be given its rightful place in Fiji’s governance framework.

Submissions from Fijians of Indian descent have also been equally staunch, calling for several elements of the 2013 Constitution to remain, including keeping “Fijian” as a shared national identity for all citizens.

Fiji’s population is made up of two main ethnic groups: the iTaukei and the Indo-Fijians. While the Indigenous Fijians own 90 percent of all land, the economic power, historically, has stayed in the hands of Indo-Fijians, mostly a handful of families.

The bread-and-butter issues, like the cost of living, lack of meaningful employment opportunities, and access to housing, affect all communities, but the Indigenous population is more affected, despite being resource-rich.

But constitutional reform and the question of who is a “Fijian” have enveloped much of the political debate under Rabuka’s coalition, after initial gains in human rights protections and opening up civic space for people with opposing views to be able to express themselves without fear — something which was not possible during the Bainimarama-era.

Unity call on social media
Fiji’s Deputy Speaker Lenora Qereqeretabua urged unity on social media over the weekend: “We need less division and more understanding. We are all Fijians,” she wrote.

The process, which is branded by its opponents as “rushed”, is expected to wrap up ahead of the next Parliament session in the first week of November for the bill’s third reading. If it passes, Fiji is set to hold its first national referendum on December 9.

Rabuka has received flak for announcing the referendum date prematurely.

For his part, the prime minister, who is the chair of the special parliamentary committee on the bill, has defended the constitutional reform process, downplaying concerns about it being rushed or lacking democratic principles.

He continues to urge the Fijian people to constructively participate in the process aimed at discarding a constitution that was “not accepted by the people”.

Original source: https://analysis1.mil-osi.com/2026/10/19/who-is-a-fijian-constitution-reform-reignites-identity-debate/

An edited version of a speech Mary Kostakidis delivered at the Media Diversity Australia Symposium where she spoke about the four pillars of journalism that are all too often weaponised in the service of gatekeeping. Deepcut News

COMMENTARY: By Mary Kostakidis

Three very apt words — Truth, Trust and Tribalism. Much of what I say will focus on the last. Because of it, the first and second often become casualties.

Our Holy Grail of journalism centres on four pillars: objectivity, impartiality, balance and neutrality. Four pillars that are all too often weaponised in the service of gatekeeping the Overton window, so that establishment interests aren’t threatened by a restless citizenry.

While this has operated somewhat more subtly in the past, it has become a charade in which allies who wield enormous power on the global stage, have dropped their masks — they have shed pants as well — and it has become harder to drink this glass of milk because there are big fat flies floating on the surface.

• READ MORE:  Israel funded the legal assault on Australian journalist Mary Kostakidis
• Other media diversity and Gaza reports

The world order intended to be based on international law, and one that has often failed to deliver accountability in the case of the most powerful, has now been comprehensively debased.

In examining the media’s role and its pretence at neutrality and balance — when it actually behaves in a most tribal, partisan way — I’ll share with you some of my own experience over decades, including where I have failed.

I will argue an important weapon in our arsenal are the principles of our shared humanity that underpin universal rights, and that adherence to those principles necessitates an ability to view and analyse the world through multiple lenses, not just that of the Global North.

This is not something we need permission to do. It is part of the core business of being a journalist if we are serious about impartiality and objectivity. It is also part and parcel of diplomacy, and should also be integral to the work of leaders, otherwise we have no chance of bringing an end to forever wars, to collaboratively resolve matters in a manner that has regard to equality, freedom and dignity for all.

Injustice perpetuated
In understanding conflict and embarking on an assessment of a situation, objectivity and impartiality are vital. However, it is not necessary for an experienced journalist to remain neutral in interpreting the significance of events. Indeed, most memorable works of journalism, such as Robert Fisk’s The Great War For Civilisation, cannot be described as “neutral”.

To hold journalism in a perpetual state of neutrality and continue to provide selective “balance” (there is little to no “balance’”in the coverage of China, Russia, Iran or Israel) is to render plausible deniability, to shield crime, to deliver impunity and to compound and perpetuate injustice, as has occurred in the way Israel’s actions have been historically and predominantly reported in Western legacy media.

This era is unprecedented — there has not been such widespread repression throughout the West, and not only in our profession — it is society wide. And what strikes you of course, is that contrary to this oft weaponised Code of Ethics, what operates — with a few notable exceptions — is an unacknowledged partisanship, as tribal as geopolitical protagonists themselves.

While we have achieved diversity in the media in terms of presence and visibility, we have not yet succeeded in injecting the diversity of perspectives required. Other than in independent media, we still must all use one lens: that of the Global North.

I had certainly hoped we would have multiple lenses in our toolkit when we started up SBS in 1980. It was, however, too ambitious, and we settled for the possible. And so here we find ourselves today.

I don’t wish to diminish the significant impact of the second public broadcaster. But our task is to look critically at our industry and how it serves the Australian public, our democracy, and how it equips us to be global citizens, in addition to being Australian citizens.

In today’s world, this type of dual citizenship is mandatory if we are to have any chance at putting an end to forever wars and belligerent partisanship to move to more respectful relationships as a multipolar world community, to look out for the survival of our fellow human beings and planet, where interests can coalesce rather than collide.

After seeing its identity and purpose reflected solely in the eyes of the British Empire, and moving seamlessly into subservience to the US, and after doing away with the White Australia Policy, our country went through interminable navel gazing in the media — who are we? What is our identity as a nation?

The answer it landed on, was “Multicultural”. Yes, we came from many cultures, and wasn’t that fab.

Hoped for something more
“Multiculturalism” was a word I studiously avoided including during my almost three decades at SBS. Not because I was a closet Pauline Hanson. But because in the very early days at the broadcaster, I had hoped for something more.

One of the early on-air promotional campaigns was centred around the Overton window metaphor: “Channel O — a Window to the World’. I was banking on a Door.

It was not to be. The debate settled on whether what was being provided was “ethnic” or “multicultural” television. Cosmopolitanism, a prism conducive to the practice of journalism, was a bridge too far for Australia in 1980. We were to celebrate our particularity — our food, dance, music and movies, but the serious work demanded by our shared humanity and diverse perspectives lay dormant.

I recall Melbourne ABC radio broadcaster Jon Faine asking me when I was appointed to present SBS World News, whether it would cover stories from a different perspective. It was a question I studiously circumvented by banging on about running background stories, which were in my view one of our strengths. I knew that our lens captured a greater part of the world, but feared it’s portrayal in the end remained comfortably within the Overton window.

On Day 1 of my induction to the newsroom, the then-chief producer made a remark I considered a statement of the obvious — that “One Man’s Terrorist is Another Man’s Freedom Fighter”. But it proved not to be obvious at all and it was soon forgotten. And she and it went the way of those background stories we used to run. We gradually transitioned from the possibilities and potential understanding offered by the perspective epitomised in that adage, to dividing the world into our allies versus an “Axis of Evil” against which a “War on Terror” needed to be fought.

This occurred in stages and among the various contributing factors was the purging of full-time staff in favour of contractors who were less likely to raise objections due to job insecurity, as well as selecting out anti-establishment views in executive roles which is the natural state of institutions. And the broadcaster slid into the natural state of the media club in manufacturing consent.

Validation was sought in sameness, the assurance you have got it right. An at times bellicose partisanship bubbled to the surface, due to both overt support for establishment views as well as a subliminal cultural bias, all of which became more pronounced with the passage of years as the organisation went through multiple changes.

SBS could have made a difference
There were times when SBS could have made a difference but chose not to, and I see that also as a personal failure. While I did not have editorial control, I did have influence.

It is true that decision makers in the newsroom were almost exclusively Anglo-Celtic, but the Board was not and we know culture is determined by the government-appointed Board which selects the CEO who appoints those beneath him or her etc.

Ethnic diversity on the Board did not prevent the organisation heading down the path it did. Visible diversity was an achievement, but it was a mere beginning, not an end in itself. It did not deliver the next stage because its ambition was limited. Whatever I did, it was not enough to have the impact required. I’ll give you a couple of examples.

In October 2006 (I left in 2007), you may recall The Australian sent a young Arabic-speaking reporter to a Lakemba Mosque expecting he would document incitement to terrorism by the Imam. He returned empty handed, but his translation of the sermon included a reference to women who do not dress modestly as “uncovered meat”. The story was front page news in The Australian and subsequently across all media mastheads and platforms in the country, including the SBS World News bulletin I presented, despite attempts on my part to explain this sort of comment was hardly unusual, didn’t merit singling out given what is routinely said by preachers of other faiths.

The incident was nevertheless used to fan the flames of strong anti-Muslim sentiment in the aftermath of 9/11 and in support of US-led wars.

The atmosphere in the newsroom was at fever pitch, it was part of a pack that smelt blood. It was a day of great shame for me personally. I’d had two experiences with another organised religion that were significantly more egregious, but comments around acceptable standards of modesty, whether you adhere to them, or think they are backward and damaging for women, did not warrant singling out for public humiliation as a serious, unacceptable and unique threat to Australian society, posed by Muslim rhetoric.

The speech of Greek Orthodox Sunday school teachers or rabbis was never subjected to a public microscope.

Exceptional pressure
During my almost three decades at SBS, first in management and then in the newsroom, in discussions with the heads of programming, news, and television, I was aware of the exceptional pressure brought to bear on decision-makers when it came to purchasing and broadcasting a film, or running a story, that portrayed a Palestinian point of view as opposed to the non-negotiable version of the Israel lobby.

The programme would have to be of a higher standard than usual to justify the resources that would inevitably be required to defend it.

After a staff meeting in the newsroom in 2004, at which I argued strongly that we had to run a particular story that the news director had been asked to pull, he told me he believed his days were numbered. There would be retribution for him after the election if the Coalition won, because in the end, he had defended our right to run the report.

This marked the end of an era of possibility, with more evident influence of editorial staff by the Israel lobby.

The imbalance in our coverage became even more pronounced and entrenched and it became virtually impossible to include the perspective of Palestinians. For many years, we crossed to an Israeli spokesperson, usually an IDF or former IDF member — for a long time Mark Regev — for “an update” as if it was to a neutral observer.

I well recall an occasion during my last year when I suggested to the on-duty chief producer that we have a Palestinian on for a change. I have not forgotten his short response, though 20 years have passed. “Why? They’re all mad.”

He had just returned from a junket to Israel, par for the course for senior journalists across media organisations. Some years earlier, I had been baffled by the boasting of another chief producer about the size and quality of the steak and bottle of red he had just consumed in a long lunch shouted by an Israel lobbyist, before returning to his shift.

Legacy media struggled over Gaza genocide
It’s not surprising that legacy media has struggled with reporting on the Gaza genocide — even without using the word — because for decades we overlooked Israel’s modus operandi for demographic engineering, either in ignorance or complicity — both inexcusable.

Small victories in resistance to this diminished, along with the dilution of solidarity on the floor. In my specific role, I resorted to a kind of reverse weaponisation of neutrality. Because of my role as anchor, I argued, I could not use expressions like the much-loved “War on Terror”, it had to be “George Bush’s War on Terror”, or a dead pan “the so-called War on Terror”.

Personal family history led me — since childhood — to want to understand how power was exercised because of the catastrophic consequences for ordinary people. Interrogating the nature of identity and the function of tribalism were pieces in that puzzle, as my grandparents had come from a multiracial society at a time when such societies were being transformed into ethno-states.

The heritage of pluralism remained in my DNA and a cosmopolitan outlook was to remain my prism. Ethnic particularity, however, was just one aspect of pluralism, as it was also only just one aspect of personal identity. Furthermore, the centrality of ethnic particularity was a core characteristic of ethnonationalism and often provided fertile ground for chauvinism and racism.

So I was somewhat of a Martian in the newsroom because my background provided a perspective that my contemporary environment had no time for. In 1967, when Israel took the West Bank, Gaza, East Jerusalem, the Sinai, and the Golan Heights — which it ethnically cleansed, wiping out 100 villages — my generation at age 13 were reading The Diary of Anne Frank, soon followed by Leon Uris’s Exodus which documented the noble struggle of Jewish pioneers forging a new life, taming “a barren” land, creating an “egalitarian” society in “a land without a people for a people without a land”.

On this cultural and formal education, British historian William Dalrymple says he was “sold a lie”. This was the prism through which the creation of Israel was seen. Arabs were an inconvenient peripheral menace. How many adults in the Western world went on from Exodus to read Rashid Khalidi’s The Hundred Years’ War on Palestine or Ghada Karmi’s Married to Another Man, or any of the books by Ilan Pappe? How many Western journalists?

For a variety of reasons, the media’s treatment of Israel is most exceptional. In general, holding our allies to the same standards as our foes would be laughed out of any newsroom — let alone questioning why said countries are considered “allies” to begin with. An attitude unhealthy in an ethnonationalist state, but in a multicultural one, it seeded problems that can’t be swept away.

Spawned discontent can’t be controlled
Certainly not with motherhood statements by politicians who avoid accountability for their policies or their obligations under international law. And the discontent spawned can’t be controlled with repressive institutional behaviour and authoritarian legislative measures.

Just as you can’t stop an oppressed group of people from rising up against its oppressors, the rest of us can’t allow our conscience to be criminalised, and so we will not be intimidated into silence.

I have made my anti-establishment views known across a raft of matters and have been trenchant in my criticism of the US government as well as our own government, but Israel was a no-no, no matter how flagrant its conduct.

The first “public” shot across the bow in this stepped-up phase of cancellation since October 7 was the sacking of Antoinette Lattouf. I say public because there are many cases that are not known about.

I was chosen because of my public profile and reputation, because I dared step outside the narrow Overton window we must all remain within at all cost, particularly in the case of Israel. I’m aware that my sharing of articles by many Jewish journalists and a range of other reputable experts who have been either shut out of mainstream media or would never get a look in, was making Zionists apoplectic.

The newly-minted young CEO of the Zionist Federation of Australia (ZFA) and a compliant journalist in the legacy media decided they would smear me as an antisemitic rape denier and fruit loop conspiracy theorist. And because no decent smear ends without references to Holocaust denial, one of the two “exclusives” remarkably managed to end on that note.

Radio silence from that masthead ever since. They all have egg on their face because the ZFA had to drop the case knowing they had no prospect of winning.

Israel getting some of its own medicine
The two posts they selected for the alleged breach were a clip of a speech by the late Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah; one post with a comment from me that the Israeli government was getting some of its own medicine and that Israel has started something it can’t finish with this genocide; and the other a mere retweet of a post by British journalist Richard Medhurst who simply reported Nasrallah’s words.

It was an interesting choice for a number of reasons, not least of which was that Medhurst was arrested three weeks after the case against me was filed.

The affront at these posts was because I had the temerity to share a clip of Nasrallah himself — a listed terrorist in Australia — and draw some sort of moral equivalence between his threat and the conduct of the Israeli government, and to indicate the consequences of that conduct would continue to escalate. How dare I compare a threat by a listed terrorist with the conduct of a terrorist state.

But Israel must be spoken of with reverence while it couches its erasure of Palestinians and theft of their land as defending itself, and those defending Palestinians must be roundly condemned as terrorists and part of that Axis of Evil, when they are seen as neither by many millions of people around the world.

That we, as journalists, must take this position as if we were mouthpieces for the US alliance or the Australian government, let alone Israel, is preposterous. It dispenses with our capacity to view our own country’s perspective and that of our allies as critically as we would any other country’s, and to have media organisations participate in this journalistic malpractice as openly as they have is astonishing.

You will be familiar with directives and guidance given to staff here, and recall The New York Times leaked memo in early 2024 directing journalists to avoid even the use of the term “Occupied Territory”, and CNN staff revealing pressure resulting in credulous reporting of Israeli claims and silencing of Palestinian perspectives, with similar pressures reported at the BBC.

Over the last decade we saw distinct fragmentation of the audience — some still relying on legacy media while others accessing information and perspectives from independent media where we have seen an explosion of outlets including YouTube channels where experts and scholars publish information and commentary.

Two very different perceptions of reality
The result has been two very different perceptions of reality. However, this chasm between segments of the public is closing for large numbers of people as the situation in Gaza and in other spheres reach such extremes. Israel’s brutal colonialism in the West Bank and Lebanon, Donald Trump’s overt gangster-capitalism and proxy war on Iran, and the rise of the far-right cannot be glossed over with a comprehensive avoidance of reality in legacy media.

The consequences are too visible and too extreme.

We can take heart that on the whole the courts won’t back the suppression of political speech — with the exception of the disappointing Jayson Gillham decision where the judge did not have a problem with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra discriminating in the colour of political comment it endorsed, legitimising support for Ukraine as policy but not so for Palestinians.

NSW Supreme Court Justice Desmond Fagan’s judgement on the heels of this decision is a masterclass in calling out the lack of common sense, gaslighting and utter bullshit.

Mary Kostakidis is an Australian journalist, political commentator, and activist. She was a member of the management team that developed SBS Television in 1980. She anchored its World News bulletin for almost 2 decades before becoming an independent journalist. This address to the Media Diversity Australia Symposium was delivered on 13 October 2026 and reproduced from Deepcut News.

Original source: https://analysis1.mil-osi.com/2026/10/19/mary-kostakidis-how-gaza-exposed-the-australian-medias-failings/

Asia Pacific Report

The Australia West Papua Association (AWPA) has condemned Australia and Indonesia conducting joint military exercises while Indonesian security forces have been conducting military operations against Papuan civilians.

About 1000 Australian Defence Force (ADF) military personnel with a similar number of Indonesian soldiers have been taking part in Exercise Keris Woomera 26 which began earlier this month and is due to end tomorrow.

It is this year’s largest overseas joint training activity for the ADF.

• READ MORE: Other West Papua reports

In a statement, Joe Collins of AWPA said Australians received the “usual mantra/statements from government” about how the exercise would “reinforce the strength” of Australia’s security relationship with Indonesia.

Collins said Australians were told: “Indonesia is an essential and enduring partner for Australia and it is significant that we share our largest overseas training activity for the year with the TNI and our ability to work together on this exercise reinforces our deep and longstanding partnership with Indonesia, underpinned by trust, mutual respect and close cooperation etc.”

However, “not so far away, the Indonesian security forces are conducting military operations against Papuan civilians and Australia says nothing”.

The Evangelical Christian Church (KINGMI) has called on the Indonesian government and humanitarian organisations to address reports of civilians fleeing their homes amid alleged military operations in the Korowai region.

The church’s Department of Justice and Peace (DKP) said it had received reports of increased military activity between October 12 and 14 in Danowage village, Yaniruma district, Boven Digoel Regency, and areas bordering Yahukimo Regency.

‘State of panic’
According to a Jubi report, the Head of the GIDI Department of Law and Human Rights, Reverend Jimmy Koirewoa, said that information from the indigenous Korowai people and other Papuan residents living in the area indicated the local population was in a “state of panic and had begun to flee”, fearing the impact of military operations.

“During military operations, local people flee because of their fear of the Indonesian security forces,” Collins said.

“They flee to the forest and can face starvation because they are afraid to go back to work in their food gardens. Each military operation creates more internal refugees.”

In an August update, Human Rights Monitor reported that there are more than 127,031 civilians across multiple regencies in West Papua remaining internally displaced due to military operations and armed conflict.

The GIDI Department of Law and Human Rights urged the Indonesian government and all relevant authorities to immediately halt the movement of troops — who are allegedly preparing for military operations within the civilian settlements of the Korowai people — and to withdraw forces from civilian areas where their presence is not required for legitimate operations.

They have also demanded that no military actions be taken that could endanger the safety of the community, incite fear, force residents to abandon their homes, or disrupt the daily lives and activities of the indigenous people.

“We emphasise that places of worship, residential homes, educational facilities, healthcare facilities, and other public amenities must be protected,” Collins said.

‘Traumatised civilians’
In a media release, the West Papua National Liberation Army (TPNPB) reported from Danowage village that following an Indonesian military deployment on October 12 and 13, the authorities immediately began a military operation the next day on October 14.

The operation “traumatised civilians”, who began fleeing that night to forests in the Boven Digoel, Oksibil, Mappi, and Yahukimo areas.

The Central High Command of the West Papua National Liberation Army (TPNPB) has also appealed to President Prabowo Subianto and his staff to immediately allow access for the International Red Cross, foreign journalists, and international human rights organisations to enter the armed conflict zone in Papua to address the humanitarian crisis and displacement of indigenous peoples in various regions of Papua.

Original source: https://analysis1.mil-osi.com/2026/10/19/advocacy-group-condemns-joint-australian-military-training-with-indonesia-and-silence-over-papua/

RNZ Pacific reporters

Original source: https://analysis1.mil-osi.com/2026/10/18/vanuatu-pm-napat-may-face-fresh-no-confidence-motion-in-november/