As the Australian federal government prepares to debate a bill on hate speech following the Bondi attack, behind closed doors a New South Wales inquiry is investigating banning a specific phrase: \u201cglobalise the intifada\u201d.<\/p>\n
The inquiry into \u201cmeasures to prohibit slogans that incite hatred\u201d closed to public submissions<\/a> on Monday after just three weeks, and will not hold any public hearings<\/a> before it hands its report to the Minns government at the end of the month.<\/p>\n Although it has been asked to review hate speech laws in general, the Labor-controlled committee has been specifically asked to consider a ban on the controversial phrase \u201cglobalise the intifada\u201d<\/a>. Intifada is an Arabic word meaning uprising or \u201cshaking off\u201d, used in reference to two Palestinian uprisings against Israel in 1987 and 2000.<\/p>\n The second intifada in particular was characterised by Israeli military attacks on Palestinian cities and towns, and multiple suicide bombings by Palestinians that killed civilians in Israeli cities.<\/p>\n Many in the Jewish community strongly associate the word intifada with indiscriminate acts of violence and terrorism.<\/p>\n In the UK, police have announced they will arrest protesters<\/a> who call for intifada. The NSW inquiry\u2019s terms of reference require it to consider \u201cinternational best practice to combat the use of such slogans\u201d \u2013 particularly in the UK.<\/p>\n Submissions against banning<\/a> the phrase have warned about importing \u201crepressive models\u201d from overseas. Policing and legal experts have warned that UK practices could be incompatible with Australia\u2019s constitution and inflame social tensions.<\/p>\n So what changes has the UK introduced and could they be coming to NSW?<\/p>\n What are the UK laws on \u2018intifada\u2019 slogans?<\/p>\n In December, the UK\u2019s Metropolitan and Greater Manchester police announced they would arrest anyone chanting the words \u201cglobalise the intifada\u201d or holding a placard with the phrase on it.<\/p>\n Sign up: AU Breaking News email<\/a><\/p>\n The heads of both forces said the country\u2019s Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) had \u201cconsistently\u201d advised them that \u201cphrases causing fear in Jewish communities\u201d didn\u2019t meet prosecution thresholds, but following the Manchester synagogue<\/a> and Bondi attacks, police had decided \u201cthe context has changed\u201d.<\/p>\n Rather than banning the phrase outright, protesters have been arrested under the country\u2019s existing Public Order Act, including five people for \u201cracially aggravated public order offences\u201d at a pro-Palestine protest in London last month.<\/p>\n But a significantly higher numbers of arrests relate to a change made in July<\/a>, when the Labour government made it a criminal offence to be a member of or show support for the UK group Palestine Action after it was proscribed as a terrorist group.<\/p>\n More than 2,100 people in the UK have been arrested for showing support for the UK group Palestine Action, many for carrying placards saying \u2018I oppose genocide, I support Palestine Action\u2019. Photograph: Anadolu\/Getty Images<\/p>\n The move was widely condemned by human rights groups including Amnesty International, who said it may breach obligations to uphold the rights to freedom of expression, and that UK terrorism laws were already \u201cexcessively broad and vaguely worded\u201d.<\/p>\n Several people linked to the group, which has used direct action to target Israeli weapons factories and their supply chains, are now on hunger strike in prison<\/a>. They are not affiliated with the Sydney Palestine Action Group (PAG).<\/p>\n The BBC reported in October that more than 2,100 people had been arrested<\/a> for showing support for Palestine Action since the change, many for carrying placards saying: \u201cI oppose genocide, I support Palestine Action\u201d. More than half of the more than 500 people arrested<\/a> at a protest in London in August last year were aged 60 or above<\/a>.<\/p>\n In November, the Metropolitan police said<\/a> 254 people had been charged under the offence since July. The offence of showing support for the group attracts a maximum sentence of six months\u2019 imprisonment.<\/p>\n Would a UK-style \u2018intifada\u2019 ban work in NSW?<\/p>\n Anne Twomey, a professor of constitutional law at the University of Sydney, said, unlike Australia, the UK did not have a constitutionally entrenched implied freedom of political communication, and bans could be more open to constitutional challenge in NSW.<\/p>\n \u201cThey don\u2019t have the constitutional constraints that we do,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n But Luke McNamara, a professor at the University of NSW law school, said using existing public order offences \u2013 including a newly created offence for inciting racial hatred (93ZAA in the NSW Crimes Act) \u2013 might be more successful than an outright ban on a phrase, which he said was more open to constitutional challenge.<\/p>\n \u201cLeaving it to the discretion of the police in a particular context, to decide whether or not a given use of a slogan constitutes a criminal offence that already exists \u2013 I think that\u2019s preferable than locking into a statute that that particular phrase or any other is involving intentional incitement of racial hatred,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cI think it\u2019s pretty clear that [\u2018globalise the intifada\u2019] means different things to different people.\u201d<\/p>\n