Netanyahu’s Planned Visit to Australia Is Met With Opposition

http://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/20/world/australia/israel-netanyahu-visit-letter-protests.html

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SYDNEY, Australia — The first visit to Australia by an Israeli prime minister was intended to be a warm meeting between the leaders of two countries with strong trade ties, giving Benjamin Netanyahu some positive coverage as his nation faces broad condemnation for pushing to expand settlements on the West Bank.

But the four-day visit, scheduled to start on Wednesday, is generating a bit of pushback. Sixty notable Australians, including political, religious, cultural and business figures, have signed a letter opposing Mr. Netanyahu’s visit because of his government’s policies toward the Palestinians. And small groups of protesters have demonstrated in Melbourne and Canberra against the visit.

“Israel continues to defy all United Nations calls for it to comply with international law in respect of its illegal settlement building and its treatment of the indigenous Palestinian population,” the letter said. It called on Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull’s administration to rethink its support of the Israeli government.

Australia was one of the few countries that spoke out against a United Nations Security Council resolution in December that condemned Israeli settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. While Israel’s closest ally, the United States, tacitly supported the resolution, the Australian government called it “one sided” and “deeply unsettling.”

Mr. Netanyahu’s visit, after a stop in Singapore, is meant to cement ties with the Turnbull government and to expand the two countries’ trade, which now totals about 1.3 billion Australian dollars ($1 billion) a year.

It is also seen as something of a diplomatic salve for Israel, whose ties with Europe have been further strained recently by new announcements of settlement construction and a new law to legalize settlements already built on private Palestinian land.

When Mr. Netanyahu visited Washington last week, President Trump appeared to back away from the United States’ long insistence on a two-state solution for the Middle East conflict. In contrast, Mr. Turnbull told Australian reporters last Thursday that his government’s support for a two-state solution had not changed.

Bill Shorten, the leader of the opposition Labor Party, is expected to meet with Mr. Netanyahu and to emphasize the rights of both Palestinians and Israelis to live within secure borders.

“I will make it clear to Mr. Netanyahu that where settlement building is an obstacle to the two-state solution, it should be stopped,” Mr. Shorten said at a news conference on Monday.

Bob Carr, a former Labor foreign minister, said in an interview that he did not sign the letter because he did not want Mr. Netanyahu’s visit to be canceled, but that “I support all the other sentiments.”

He added: “Australian public opinion, whenever it’s been measured in opinion polls, has supported the establishment of the Palestinian state. It’s now hard to find many supporters of Israel outside the Jewish community in Australia or conservative politicians who enjoy the support of the Israel lobby.”

Colin Rubenstein, executive director of the Australia/Israel and Jewish Affairs Council, an advocacy group, called the statements in the letter “misplaced, illogical and counterproductive,” but he said he did not think they would affect Mr. Netanyahu’s visit.