Australia's peak Jewish body has sharply criticised the Labor Party's draft national platform, accusing it of removing key language requiring Hamas to disarm while placing disproportionate blame on Israel — even as Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has made those very positions central to his government's Middle East policy.
The Executive Council of Australian Jewry co-chief executive Peter Wertheim issued the condemnation ahead of the ALP's national conference in Adelaide, where foreign policy issues — including the contentious Israel-Palestine section — are scheduled to be debated on the final day of proceedings.
Platform 'regurgitates one-eyed obsession with blaming Israel'
Wertheim, who has a long-standing relationship with Albanese dating back two decades to when the then-opposition figure publicly opposed the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement against Israel, said the draft document lacked balance and contradicted the government's own stated positions.
"Instead of providing an honest assessment of the leadership on both sides of the conflict, the draft platform regurgitates the same old one-eyed obsession with blaming Israel," Wertheim said, in the Jewish peak body's first public comments on the draft platform.
Wertheim questioned why the platform had been amended to remove explicit language calling on Hamas to disarm, given that Albanese himself told the United Nations General Assembly last September that "the terrorist organisation Hamas can have no role in Palestine's future." The Prime Minister also stated at that time that Australia's recognition of a Palestinian state was predicated on commitments from the Palestinian Authority — including that Hamas would hand over its weapons to Palestinian security forces and never control Gaza again.
"It is a reasonable question to ask why the ALP national conference is not backing in the Albanese government in expressly recognising the government's position on excluding Hamas," Wertheim said.
He noted that even Hamas had implicitly acknowledged the reality of its changed position by announcing a handover of government functions to a US-backed technocratic committee. "But apparently the ALP National Conference cannot quite bring itself to acknowledge it. The best it can do is refer to Hamas, in passing, as a terrorist group," he said.
Palestinian Authority commitments also absent from draft
Wertheim also took aim at what he described as the platform's silence on conditions attached to Australia's recognition of Palestinian statehood, which the government declared in September 2025. He said the draft made no mention of the Palestinian Authority's commitments to governance reform, ending payments to the families of Palestinian prisoners, school curriculum changes, or holding general elections.
"The draft platform says nothing about any of this, or the fact that there has not been the slightest progress towards fulfilling the commitments made by the Palestinian Authority to the Australian government," he said.
Foreign Minister Penny Wong, when announcing $25 million in new aid funding for Palestine earlier in the week, similarly stated: "Hamas can play no role in the State of Palestine." Wertheim said the platform should reflect this position explicitly.
Israel's embassy makes rare intervention
The controversy was compounded by a highly unusual move from Israel's embassy in Australia, which released a four-page unsigned statement taking issue with the draft platform's language — a rare intervention by a foreign government in an Australian political party's internal policy process.
The embassy argued that several elements of the draft "risk placing responsibility for the conflict on one party while giving insufficient attention to the decisions, conduct and continuing obligations of the Palestinian leadership and terrorist organisations such as Hamas."
The embassy also pushed back on the platform's condemnation of "extremist settler violence," characterising it as a "reprehensible but marginal phenomenon" that receives "disproportionate attention." This stands in contrast to UN monitoring data, which has documented more than 1,000 Israeli settler attacks causing casualties or property damage this year — averaging six incidents per day — resulting in the displacement of more than 2,200 Palestinians.
Israel also objected to the platform's support for the International Criminal Court, which has issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former defence chief over allegations including using starvation as a method of warfare and directing attacks against civilians in Gaza. Israel rejects the court's jurisdiction and argues it is biased against the Jewish state. For context on the broader diplomatic fallout between Israel and Australia, the two countries have experienced mounting tensions in recent months.
Labor seeks unity but faces internal divisions
Labor had reportedly planned a symbolic show of unity by having two Melbourne MPs — Josh Burns, who is Jewish, and Bassem Abdo, the son of Palestinian refugees — jointly present the Israel-Palestine section of the platform at the Adelaide conference. However, internal divisions over the platform's wording have threatened to overshadow that gesture.
Sources within the party indicated that former cabinet minister Ed Husic, a vocal critic of Israel's conduct in Gaza, had been pushing internally for the platform to go further in its criticisms of Israel. Husic did not respond to requests for comment.
The draft platform does condemn terrorism "including as perpetrated by Hamas and other extremists," reiterates support for a two-state solution, and states that Israel "must comply with obligations as an occupying power" under international humanitarian law. It also condemns Israeli laws passed in 2026 relating to capital punishment for Palestinians convicted of deadly attacks, which the UN has warned may breach international humanitarian law.
Minister for International Development and Multicultural Affairs Anne Aly appeared to brush aside the Israeli embassy intervention, saying: "The Israeli embassy can put what they want to say, but the conference is about the Labor Party coming together and settling on our platform and having those robust discussions."
