Senator admits Government embarrassment
A staunchly pro-Israel Labor parliamentarian has admitted the government was embarrassed last week when it and the Greens voted down a Liberal motion in the Senate condemning the Israel boycott.
Senatpr Glenn Sterle
Senator Glenn Sterle, the chair of the Australia-Israel Parliamentary Friendship Group, said he was “absolutely furious” when he saw the motion.
“I’m not going to make excuses,” the West Australian senator said, explaining that Bob Carr did not see the motion prior to the vote. “The system failed.”
“If Bob had’ve known he would have made a one-minute statement [against the boycott, divestment and sanctions campaign].
“Then we would’ve voted against the motion on party lines,” he said. “I was absolutely furious.”
He added: “I hate seeing Israel used as a political football.”
Although the federal Greens does not support BDS, the NSW branch did briefly support the Israel boycott before backtracking in a move widely believed to have cost them at the ballot box in the last NSW state election. “I detest the Greens position on this,” Sterle said.
He said he contacted Jewish leaders after the vote to explain what happened.
Seventy-eight Australian federal parliamentarians are members of the Israel friendship group, he said.
How slack!! How can a Member vote without seeing the motion beforehand?
Rita, right again and hitting the nailed Carr right in the guts of the issue, Carr voted with his well established feelings for ( read AGAINST) Israel. He did not need to see the document because he only had to rely on what his inner ideological methabolism dictates. But, hey who’s got his pixies with the leadership of the Jewish community, you know the ones who know it all, including that Bob Carr is our BEST friend. I mean the bestest; right , Peter, Yair, Danny, Phillip !!??
( otto not that silly to wait for an answer no more )
I cannot believe that Carr didn’t see the motion. He spoke about the motion in terms of foreign policy ramifications and the naming of people. Sen Searle is right to be upset by the use of Israel as a political football, but an amendment could have taken the motion out of partisan politics. And the FM failed to make any statement on BDS.
Bob The Wrecker still dreams about an Aussie bum on a Security Council seat. And while that ambition is laudable the grovelling before tyrranical Jew hating regimes to (possibly) get that seat is despicable and embarrassing.
Bob Carr didn’t see the motion prior to the vote, and it wouldn’t’ have been bantered around the tracks off circuit at some stage?
He’s an astitute politician and wouldn’t be where he is today if he wasn’t.
Sorry for the pessimism.
How many of the 78 Australian Federal parlamentarians are from the Left? As to Bob Carr he has shown recently quite distinctly where his sympaties lie.