In a letter sent to Netanyahu on Thursday, Executive Council of Australian Jewry president Daniel Aghion said the Israeli prime minister’s comments about Albanese “were inflammatory and provocative, and demonstrated a woeful lack of understanding of social and political conditions in Australia”.

“These comments have played straight into the hands of opponents of Israel and antisemites, to the
detriment of the Australian Jewish community,” he wrote.

“Had we been consulted, we would have warned against such a clumsy intervention into Australia’s domestic politics.

“The charge of antisemitism, whether made directly or indirectly, is a serious one and never to be made lightly.”

In a separate letter to Albanese, Aghion said the prime minister had been “excessive and gratuitously insulting” to Netanyahu last week by saying he was in denial about the suffering of Palestinian civillians in Gaza.

“It was unseemly for an Australian prime minister to depart from diplomatic norms concerning the leader of a country with which Australia has had friendly relations for many decades,” he said.

“You could simply have said that you vehemently disagreed with the Israeli prime minister, without descending into a personal attack.”

Arguing that both leaders were at fault for the deteriorating relationship, Aghion urged the two prime ministers to use “measured and seemly language befitting national leaders” to get bilateral links back on track.

Zionist Federation of Australia president Jeremy Leibler described Netanyahu’s comments as “entirely unhelpful and unproductive”.

“I don’t think the use of personal or inflammatory language is appropriate or helpful,” he told this masthead.

Leibler praised Albanese for acting as a “statesman” by declining to fire back at Netanyahu, saying that it was wrong to describe the government’s decision to deny Rothman a visa as antisemitic even though he disagrees with the move.

“The relationship is clearly under strain,” Leibler said. “Both nations should return to what brings them together and respectful discussion.”

Israel’s centrist opposition leader Yair Lapid accused Netanyahu of handing Albanese a political “gift” by attacking him. “The thing that most strengthens a leader in the democratic world today is a confrontation with Netanyahu, the most politically toxic leader in the Western world,” he said in a post on X.

Earlier on Wednesday, Burke hit back at Netanyahu for attacking Albanese.

“Strength is not measured by how many people you can blow up or how many children you can leave hungry,” Burke, who is one of the prime minister’s closest political allies, told ABC radio.

Instead, he said, Albanese had shown strength by calling Netanyahu before Australia moved to recognise Palestine.

Netanyahu, who spoke to Albanese a fortnight ago, said on his official X account on Tuesday night: “History will remember Albanese for what he is: A weak politician who betrayed Israel and abandoned Australia’s Jews.”

Following the Netanyahu government’s decision to cancel visas for Australian diplomats working in the West Bank, Burke said: “What we are seeing with some of the actions they’re taking is a form of a continued isolation of Israel from the world, and that is not in their interests.”

Sky News reported that Netanyahu had sent a letter to world leaders, including Albanese, who had moved to recognise a Palestinian state at the United Nations in September as part of a push to restart momentum for a two-state solution.

“Your call for a Palestinian state pours fuel on this antisemitic fire,” the letter reads. “It is not diplomacy, it is appeasement. It rewards Hamas terror, hardens Hamas’s refusal to free the hostages, emboldens those who menace Australian Jews and encourages the Jew-hatred now stalking your streets.”

Ophir Falk, a foreign policy adviser to Netanyahu, doubled down on his boss’s comments on Wednesday afternoon, accusing Albanese of handing Hamas a political prize by agreeing to recognise a Palestinian state after the October 7, 2023, attacks.

“The fact of the matter is that the Australian government is morally bankrupt,” he told the ABC. “I call upon [Albanese] to come to his senses.”

Burke said he had blocked Rothman’s visa application and that of former Israeli Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked last year because they had described Palestinian children as enemies and snakes.

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“Now, if anyone wanted to come on a public speaking tour and they had those views publicly expressed about Israeli children, I would block the visa, and I am going to not have a lower bar for the protection of views that are bigoted views against the Palestinian people,” Burke said.

He has also cancelled visa applications from American political provocateur Candace Owens and rapper Kanye West because of comments they made that offended the Jewish community.

The Home Affairs assessment of grounds for cancellation says: “the visa holder’s social media and public statements … mirror the policies of his Religious Zionist Party, including the elimination of Hamas and the expansion and sovereignty of the Israeli state and denial of any wrongdoing by Israel against Palestinians and Gaza during the current conflict. These statements have been received by members of the Australian community as inflammatory and concerning.”

In an interview with Britain’s Channel 4 News earlier this year, Rothman said, “they are our enemies”, when asked about Palestinian children in Gaza and denied they were dying of hunger.

Opposition home affairs spokesman Andrew Hastie said the Albanese government failed to recognise what this cancellation would mean. “This wasn’t just any old visa,” he told ABC Radio National. “I’m sure [Rothman] said a whole range of things that I probably wouldn’t agree with, but nonetheless, he’s a member of the Knesset.”

Full text of Netanyahu’s letter to Albanese

Dear Prime Minister,

I am concerned with the alarming rise of antisemitism in Australia and the lack of decisive action by your government to confront it.

Throughout the past year, antisemitism has scarred Australian cities. Since your public statements signaling recognition of a Palestinian state, it has intensified.

Following Hamas’s savage attack on the people of Israel on October 7, 2023, pro-Hamas extremists and left-wing radicals began a campaign of intimidation, vandalism and violence against Jews across the free world. In Australia, that campaign has intensified under your watch. In June, vandals defaced a historic Melbourne synagogue with graffiti praising Iran and calling to “Free Palestine.” In July, arsonists targeted the East Melbourne Hebrew Congregation during Shabbat dinner, forcing twenty worshippers to flee for their lives. That same night, masked rioters stormed an Israeli-owned restaurant in central Melbourne, destroying property, hurling furniture and shouting “Death to the IDF.” These are not isolated incidents. This is an epidemic.

Your call for a Palestinian state pours fuel on this antisemitic fire. It is not diplomacy, it is appeasement. It rewards Hamas terror, hardens Hamas’s refusal to free the hostages, emboldens those who menace Australian Jews and encourages the Jew-hatred now stalking your streets.

As President Trump has shown, antisemitism can and must be confronted. The President is protecting the civil rights of American Jews, enforcing the law, prosecuting public order and prosecuting antisemitic crimes. He has also deported Hamas sympathizers and revoked the visas of foreign students who incite violence against Jews.

Prime Minister, antisemitism is a cancer. It spreads when leaders stay silent. It retreats when leaders act. I call upon you to replace weakness with action, appeasement with resolve, and to do so by a clear date: the Jewish New Year, September 23, 2025.

History will not forgive hesitation. It will honor action.

Sincerely,

[Signature of Benjamin Netanyahu]

Benjamin Netanyahu

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