In the hours after Donald Trump proposed ethnic cleansing in Gaza, Australian officials drafted a public response that directly opposed exiling Palestinians from the besieged territory.
But Anthony Albanese took a more ambiguous line at a press conference at Parliament House the same day, with the prime minister insisting Australia’s support for a two-state solution hadn’t changed.
Documents obtained by Crikey under freedom of information (FOI) laws reveal how the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) rushed to prepare “talking points” responding to Trump’s comments on February 5.
“PM does press at midday — we need a turnaround in the next five minutes,” an official in the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet (PM&C) wrote in an email to DFAT seeking urgent feedback on draft talking points at 11.24am.
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Talking points are official lines that the PM and ministers can use as a guide when questioned by journalists or opposition politicians.
On the morning of February 5 (Australian time), Trump hosted Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the White House. The US president described Gaza as a “demolition site” and said “all” of the Palestinians in the territory should be permanently resettled elsewhere.
Trump was expanding on his previous comments that Egypt and Jordan should “take people” from Gaza and “we just clean out that whole thing”. Human Rights Watch said the proposal would amount to “an alarming escalation of forced displacement and ethnic cleansing of Palestinians in Gaza”.
A senior DFAT official replied to PM&C at 11.30am to say the draft talking points “look fine” but added: “Below are some points on relocation if needed.”
These extra talking points said Palestinians and Arab countries opposed displacing people from Gaza.
If journalists “pressed” further on the issue, the talking points said the usable response was: “Australia has been clear in opposing forcible displacement of Palestinians from Gaza.”
Albanese did not utter that line in his Canberra press conference and tried to stay focused on a health funding announcement. He fielded seven questions about Trump’s remarks but repeatedly declined to “give a daily commentary on statements by the US president”.
It is not clear from the FOI documents whether the forcible displacement lines were included in the final version PM&C sent to Albanese’s office before the press conference, but emails from earlier that day indicate DFAT was planning to add them to parliamentary question time briefing materials.
Dr Melanie O’Brien, an associate professor of international law at the University of Western Australia and president of the International Association of Genocide Scholars, said it “shouldn’t be this hard” for Australian leaders to condemn forcible displacement.
“Trump’s proposal is disgusting, it’s disgraceful, and it most certainly is proposing ethnic cleansing,” O’Brien told Crikey in an interview.
O’Brien explained that ethnic cleansing “doesn’t exist as an international crime in itself and there isn’t one agreed upon definition” but relates to the removal of a people from one territory to another based on their identity.
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“It doesn’t necessarily involve killing. It’s about moving those people. And that’s what differentiates it from genocide, which is about the destruction of those people.”
If Trump’s proposal was implemented, O’Brien said, “the crime that it could be prosecuted under would be the crime against humanity of deportation.”
Crikey asked Albanese’s office why the PM had not expressed direct opposition to forcible displacement of Palestinians on February 5 and whether he had wished to avoid antagonising Trump. We also sought clarity about whether the stronger DFAT talking points had made it to Albanese’s desk.
A government spokesperson responded that Australia had “consistently been part of an international call for safe, unimpeded and rapid humanitarian access to Gaza and for compliance with international law”.
“Australia has been clear that forced displacement of Palestinians from Gaza would breach international law,” the spokesperson told Crikey on Wednesday. Australia continued to “press for a ceasefire, the return of hostages, and the protection of civilians”.
In a reflection of this week’s tougher rhetoric from Australia and other Western governments, the spokesperson also said: “Abhorrent comments by members of the Netanyahu government and the ongoing denial of humanitarian assistance to the civilian population are unacceptable.”
Even though Albanese avoided strong language at his February 5 press conference in response to Trump, Finance Minister Katy Gallagher told the ABC’s Insiders program four days later: “If you’re talking forced displacement … that is not consistent with international law.”
Albanese had, himself, used blunter language more than a year earlier when he and the leaders of Canada and New Zealand jointly declared: “We oppose the forcible displacement of Palestinians from Gaza, the re-occupation of Gaza, any reduction in territory, and any use of siege or blockade.”
The Australian Centre for International Justice said opposing the forcible transfer of civilians from Gaza was “not a matter of political preference, but a legal and moral imperative grounded in international humanitarian law”.
The centre’s acting executive director, Lara Khider, said: “Silence or ambiguity in such moments not only undermines Australia’s credibility but risks enabling impunity.”
Should Labor speak out more forcefully on Gaza?
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