Fringe anti-Zionist group leads campaign pushing Australian parliament to sanction Israel

BRISBANE, Australia – The Jewish Council of Australia (JCA) – a fringe far Left group with close ties to Australian Palestinian groups that have described October 7 as “resistance” and marched for an Arab state to replace Israel “from the river to the sea” – has taken the lead on a new drive to get the Australian parliament to sanction Israel.

Aimed at sanctioning Israel, the initiative is supported by the Australian Palestine Advocacy Network and other groups that have been at the forefront of the pro-Hamas marches that erupted after October 7.

In reality, in its order of January 26, 2024, the ICJ found only that what was plausible was the right of Palestinians in Gaza to be protected from genocide, as well as South Africa’s right to bring the case to court.

Then-ICJ president Joan Donoghue later told the BBC that the ICJ “didn’t decide that the claim of genocide was plausible.” “The shorthand that often appears, which is that there’s ‘a plausible case of genocide,’ isn’t what the court decided.”

Chris Sidoti, the Australian lawyer on the controversial United Nations commission of inquiry that accused Israel of genocide, is also behind the initiative.

Sidoti has a long history of trying to delegitimize Israel as “a settler colonial apartheid state” and, according to UN Watch, trivializing antisemitism. In 2022, he told a UN human rights panel that Jews “throw around accusations of antisemitism like rice at a wedding.”

JCA has taken point on a campaign by the Australian Palestine Advocacy Network and other pro-Palestine groups to lobby against the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism in Australian public institutions and healthcare.

The JCA has also campaigned against commissions of inquiry into antisemitism, and its leaders and members have marched in rallies since October 7 in which crowds chanted for Israel’s annihilation and posters of Hamas leaders and the terror group’s flag were raised.

The Australian media and government platform the JCA and have even included it on panels dealing with antisemitism – partly due to a lack of awareness of its close ties with the APAN and other organizations behind the post-October 7 marches in Australia. These led to the worst antisemitism in Australian history that paved the way to the Bondi terror attacks in December 2025.

A philanthropist who asked to remain anonymous said: “The Jewish leadership bodies need to make clear to the public, the media, and the government that the JCA represents the interests of APAN and not Australian Jewry.

“Maybe then they will stop platforming the JCA as in any way representative of the interests or wellbeing of the Jewish community. Rather, the JCA is the exact opposite. It works in lockstep with APAN,” the philanthropist said.

Also partnering with the JCA and APAN on the initiative is Muslim Aid Australia.

In 2008, the Australian Federal Police raided Muslim Aid Australia’s Sydney office while investigating alleged use of Palestinian Relief and Development Fund (Interpal), a group banned in Australia and listed in the US over alleged Hamas links.

MAA canceled a fundraising campaign and has been allowed to operate since.

Another group partnering with JCA on the initiative is the Australian Muslim Advocacy Network. Its director Adel Salman described the October 7 massacre as a “legitimate act of resistance.”

Rita Jabri Markwell, AMAN’s lawyer and one of the Red Lines drafters, was asked at the Royal Commission into Antisemitism last month whether her proposed anti-dehumanization framework would cover a hypothetical campus message calling Zionist students “animals” who should “feel subhuman.” Her answer: “I don’t think, on the face of it, that it would.”