AL-GHORBA

The Hon. SHAOQUETT MOSELMANE (22:19): In my final adjournment speech, I take great pride in speaking on justice for the Palestinian people. I am honoured that I have been in a small way a part of NSW Labor and national Labor conferences that have over the years called on Labor in government to recognise the State of Palestine. The most recent unanimous reaffirmation of Labor's support was at the 2021 national conference, which enshrined it in the party's policy platform. The motion called for a Federal Labor Government to recognise Palestine as a State and to support United Nations Security Council Resolution 1397, which was adopted in 2002.

I look forward to a further reaffirmation of that position passing at our upcoming NSW Labor conference next month and to the Albanese Labor Government to make good on Labor's promise to the Arab Australian community sooner rather than later. Since the partition of Palestine in 1948, many in Labor have supported the recognition of Palestine established on the principle of a permanent two-State solution based on the 1967 borders as the realisation of the inalienable right of the Palestinian people. Australia's 1948 historic position was put by then foreign Minister Dr H. V. Evatt, as chairman of the UN Special Committee on Palestine, who authorised the partition of Palestine into two States. Upon the basis of that decision, the State of Israel was created.

Whitlam's 1972 policy on Palestine was even‑handed. It built upon Dr Evatt's 1948 two-State solution. This was followed by the Hawke Government's 1983 acknowledgement of the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination. Soon after was the Keating Government's continued support for the basic principle of a two-State solution, a position re-endorsed by the Rudd and Gillard Labor governments. However, it was with the Rudd and Gillard governments that Labor in government began to take that extra step in balancing Labor's positive position vis-a-vis Palestine, specifically under the Carr foreign ministry. In the campaign for recognition for Palestine, Prime Minister Rudd told the ABC RadioPM program:

… the time has come for Australia to join countries like Sweden and the Holy See in formally recognising the Palestinian State. It is time for Australia to draw a line in the sand on this matter, as 137 States already have.

The late former Prime Minister Bob Hawke also joined Kevin Rudd, Gareth Evans and Bob Carr in calling on Australia to recognise Palestine as a State. In a 2017Financial Review opinion piece, Hawke called on the Australian Government to recognise the State of Palestine:

Australia was there at the very beginning. The least we can do now, in these most challenging of times, is to do what 137 other nations have already done—grant diplomatic recognition to the State of Palestine.

This significant call to recognise Palestine was echoed in a landmark speech by the Hon. Bob Carr on 30 July 2017 at the NSW Labor State conference, by driving home the point that it is time to recognise Palestine. Australia must act now, before Israel gobbles up the remaining Palestinian territories. It may be too late, given the rate of settlements taking place on Palestinian land.

I am proud to be a member of a party that supports peace and justice for the Palestinian people. The recognition of a Palestinian State is also a rebuke to those who continue to cover up Israel's apartheid practices, its human rights abuses, its ongoing illegal occupation of Palestinian land, its ongoing hostilities and the subjugation of the Palestinian people, the illegal settlements as well as the blockade of the Gaza Strip, the collective punishment, the ever-deepening humanitarian crises and the daily suffering of the Palestinian people. I am proud to have been part of this journey in support of justice for the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people, an indigenous people who have never ceded rights to their land. No matter the oppression, no matter the subjugation, no matter the occupation, no matter the dehumanisation or the attempted eradication of Palestinian culture and rights, justice will prevail and Palestine will be once again.

The DEPUTY PRESIDENT (The Hon. Wes Fang): The question is that this House do now adjourn.

Motion agreed to.

The House adjourned at 22:23 until Tuesday 11 October 2022 at 14:30.

Good evening

It is my pleasure to once again address you at this home of literature, poetry and culture, and this time, it is about a brilliant book by May Tabbah “Charbel Baini: A poem which has been sung by poems”

Author May Tabbah, a scholar, who comes from a distinguished background of intellects, has been a leading light and a driving force in the promotion of Arab literature and just causes, at various capacities. She is known for her vision, openness and brave views, in addition to her strong advocacy of the women movement.

In this book, May Tabbah sheds light on the life of poet Charbel Baini in a unique way, as she takes the reader on a fascinating journey. She begins with drawing attention to a young rebellious Charbel Baini, whose spirited thoughts are deemed as the main instigator for his probably self proclaimed exile, which came to the fore, despite his unmeasurable admiration for his motherland.

May notes that Baini’s uprising against old customized ideas became evident in his initial book “Murahika” in which he caused significant controversy, that did not win him at the time many “daring” friends. However, Baini managed to escape the shackles of social restrictions and succeeded in establishing his poetry as a platform from which he launched an amazing school of free line of rousing thoughts and inspiring ideas. And thus, Baini won the battle of freedom, not just from external intolerance, but also from internal fear.

May also analyses in depth Baini’s poetry methods and style, reviewing how his poems tend to tackle various patriotic, social and emotional issues, and how each poem touches the soul and senses of fascinated readers and listeners alike.

She underlines how Baini nurtured the love for Lebanon he brought with him, and how he turned it into a scope of endless colourful images that reflect a faultless foray of human warmth, by which he was able to dissolve the frosty existence of the Ghorbi, and from which he recreated a version of his old native home, not just for himself, but rather for far too many people, who are onboard the same rollercoaster of emotions as he is.

There is no doubt that May Tabbah excels in summarising the values detected and often felt in Charbel Baini’s poetry. These values consist of freedom, equality, courage, human rights, love for the people and for the motherland, as well as for fairness and harmony.

In conclusion, May refers to the long list of poets, who sang Charbel Baini’s praises, selecting a few poems that express what lovers of poetry have experienced and felt when interacting with his motivating poems.

Congratulations to author May Tabbah on an exceptionally valuable book, which will certainly enrich the Arabic library.

Congratulations also on being awarded the Charbel Baini Medal for 2022, wishing you, estaz Charbel Baini and Dr Ali Bazzi all of the very best in your future endeavours.

Thanks so much for listening

Occupied Palestine (Nablus)

On November 15 of each year, PEN launches its solidarity campaign under the title “The Imprisoned Writer’s Day”, in which it sheds light on the cases of writers imprisoned or facing trial, and through which it calls for urgent international action to release and protect them. These cases symbolize --that We highlight-- the patterns of threats and attacks that writers and journalists around the world are often subjected to as a result of their peaceful practices of freedom expression.”

The previous paragraph topped the international campaign launched by the "PEN International" to advocate for imprisoned writers around the world for the current year 2021 under the title "Prisoner Writer's Day 2021". It targeted in its campagine the writers “Selahattin Demirtas” on Tuesday 15 November - Tuesday 16 November, Rahil Daut - Wednesday 17 November, a collective case of 12 Eritrean writers - Thursday 18 November, and Mohamed Al-Roken - Friday 19 November. Al-Roken imprisoned in the United Arab Emirates is the only Arab writer in this campaign.

There are many writers imprisoned by Arab regimes in all parts of the Arab world, and there is no Arab prison without a writer, poet or journalist. The Arab countries have turned into a place where the writer is humiliated, and becomes either fired, exiled, or imprisoned or becomes a domesticated sheep devoured by the regime, then turned into nothing but a daily hypocrisy trumpet who broadcasts its nonsense in newspapers and magazines in glorifying the Arab dictator. In other cases he turns to prevarication or to silence. In all of which are cases that the Arab regime bears its burden in the life of the Arab writer.

Perhaps what the Arab writer is exposed to especially in the Arab “slaughterhouses of death” is enough for the International PEN Organization to start a special campaign to introduce these “forgotten” people in Arab prisons, although these campaigns, if they happen, will not be acceptable to the Arab regimes, and will be completely ignored. The Arab dictatorial regime, in all its actions, is protected from the Western regime and so it is safe and reassuring, and this regime will consider these campaigns useless, passing matter and deserve nothing. Nevertheless, none of the governmental organization dares to stand with them and adopt their causes. Many writers died in Egyptian prisons under the pretext of combating terrorism and the Brotherhood’s tide, and some of them are still living in very difficult conditions inside the prisons of the Egyptian regime. Silence is applied to their status and names, no one talks about them.

This is what concerns the Arab countries and Arab writers, but in occupied Palestine, the matter is more horrific, and the writer is not only imprisoned in the prisons of the Palestinian Authority, which brutally suppresses freedom of expression with the help of a number of opportunistic utilitarian intellectuals who turned into hypocritical “ewes”, defending the authority and its actions against the writers. At the same time, none of the Palestinian non-governmental organization defending these writers or adopting their causes, neither the Palestinian Writers Union nor the local human rights institutions, or there are human rights campaigns led by independent intellectuals, not to mention the silence of the Ministry of Culture and the official media, because of being part of the Palestinian Authority. This situation is more or less the same as what is happening in Gaza, where the authority in the besieged strip sticks its sharp nails into the bodies and souls of writers, and they are attacked with beatings as well, just as it happens in the West Bank.

The cruelest thing in occupied Palestine is what is happening inside the prisons of the Zionist occupation. The occupation has taken a clear strategy against all writers who engage in the culture of resistance and call for liberation and the right of self-determination, and to fight against the occupation and get rid of it and its evil. As a result I can say that, all Palestinian writers have gone through the experience of detention in the prisons of the Zionist occupation since 1948 until today, and other additional measures were applied to Palestinian writers such as house arrest, dismissal from work, travel ban, deportation, confiscation of books, and sabotage of public and private libraries, inspecting school books, punishing anyone who has a book that the occupation has placed on its blacklist, restricting the entry of books into the occupied territories of Palestine, and preventing the holding of cultural seminars that do not fit what the authorities or the military ruler thinking.

Perhaps the International PEN does not know that there are currently dozens of writers in the prisons of the Zionist occupation on whom the occupation authorities have imposed high sentences. Hundreds of years will be spent by writers or even after death, if they happen to die in prison. The “corpse” must spend the full term, The sentence does not end with death. Does PEN know that?

Does the International PEN know that these imprisoned writers, along with thousands of Palestinian prisoners, are deprived of basic human rights inside prisons, as they are subjected to unjustified beatings, and to confiscation of their personal belongings, books, notebooks, pens and drafts of their writings, and are subjected to isolation and imprisonment without trial, under the title of the secret file, some of them are in open prison sentences time under the heading of "administrative detention"?

Does PEN know that thousands of books written by writers in prisons, have been destroyed, confiscated and prevented from mentioning its writers, under the pretext that they are serious “terrorist acts” that incite “violence”? Does the International PEN know that there are female writers in Zionist prisons who were arrested because of their “inciting” writings, as the occupation authorities claim, as it happened in Jerusalem, and it happened in other areas within the occupied areas under the authorities since 1948?

Does the International PEN know that the occupation authorities impose imprisonment on every writer who refuses military service in the ranks of the so-called army, and is punished with a prison term of up to nine months. This happened with the poet Samih al-Qasim, with the poet Marzouk al-Halabi, the writer Saeed Nafaa, Osama Melhem and many others? And it will happen to every writer who refuses this kind of "compulsory conscription."

Does the International PEN know that the occupation authorities are demolishing entire villages and expelling their owners from them? Including the writer Sheikha Heliwa, who used to live in the Haifa area, and her village, Tail al-Araj, located on the outskirts of Haifa, was demolished. And now she lives outside her hometown. And her village is unrecognized. Does the International PEN know what the occupation authorities mean by this term “unrecognized” villages? It means that they are villages that must be removed as they are illegal, and the authorities do not provide them with water and electricity, and do not recognize the existence of an administrative authority for them (a municipality or a village council).

Does the International PEN know that every day a male or female writer is born inside the prisons of the occupation to tell the story of his arrest and imprisonment. After being abandoned by international and local laws, and waiting for a miracle to be liberated from the life of the “isthmus” in which he lives? These writers have no hope except what they make on paper, they work with the theory of "illusion of freedom", they believe or make themselves believe that when they write they are practicing the act of freedom or trying to escape from prison and escape outside the iron room. They are trained to live with emptiness no more than. In fact, freedom is their neglected demand. Who can support these writers? Who will raise their issues to be supported by their fellow writers around the world?

Finally, does the International PEN know that there are Palestinian writers imprisoned in the prisons of the Arab regimes in Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates as well, not just the writer Muhammad Al-Roken? In the belly of the whale there in Saudi Arabia is the poet Ashraf Fayyad and in the Emirates the poet Ramez Mansour whom nobody know about his destiny, he is missing, or he may have died, so there is no information about his health condition and his threatened life.

After all, the International PEN Organization must know that the Palestinian writer’s suffering is complex, from the Palestinian Authority, as an Arab regime, and from the occupation authorities and Arab regimes, and it must pay attention to these writers and their suffering in these prisons, which extend to more than twenty prisons at least.

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* Note: I am publishing this article to coincide with the International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People on November 29, 2021.