Qantas crew members don Palestinian pins while serving passengers
Qantas has received a rebuke from AJA for a decision by staffers to display Palestinian flag pins on a Dec. 20 flight from Melbourne to Hobart.
A man who is not Jewish took photos of the staffers during the flight’s food service and told Sky News that he felt “intimidated” by the display.
“If employees are found to be using their roles for political activism while passengers are essentially captive in the air, they should be dismissed,” said Robert Gregory, CEO of the member organisation Australian Jewish Association.
A spokesperson for Qantas stated that crew members cannot “wear any badges unless they are part of the approved uniform policy” and that “every customer should feel safe and respected when flying on a Qantas Aircraft.”
Alex Ryvchin, co-CEO of Australia’s peak Jewish organisation, The Executive Council of Australian Jewry, told J-Wire: “This may seem like a harmless act of solidarity, but the context is important. The Jewish people are reeling from the greatest atrocities committed against us since the Holocaust. These atrocities were committed in the name of the Palestinian cause and its flag. To see that flag at this time is traumatic, and wearing the pin, at the very least, shows a complete lack of empathy and, at worse, is a deliberate provocation intended to re-injure our community. Either way, it shouldn’t happen and Qantas needs to ensure that it doesn’t.
Qantas will be “counselling” the crew members regarding their on-the-job advocacy against Israel.
JNS/J-Wire
While Qantas is counselling its crew members – it should get them all to read this article in the New York Times: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/28/world/middleeast/oct-7-attacks-hamas-israel-sexual-violence.html