3 Oct 2007 | Comment, News
As Israelis tuned in to hear about what seemed, for a few terrible days, the opening shots in a long-anticipated war, reporters on the Knesset beat scrambled urgently for information. Ehud Olmert appeared in view, projecting his usual elastic confidence. ‘Prime Minister,’ shouted the reporters, ‘what is your comment about the Syrian claim of an Israeli infiltration?’ The prime minister didn’t even slow down. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ he said, and disappeared behind the meeting-room door. For the next few days, this would be the only official comment the citizens would have on an incident that could have plunged their country into another war.
Three weeks on, there is still very little knowledge of what actually occurred in north-west Syria, or why. Aside from a couple of comments from low-ranking politicians and a heap of rumours, all the information we Israelis got came with the talisman prefix of ‘foreign sources claim’. Veteran columnist Gideon Levy bitterly complained in a Ha’aretz op-ed: ‘We can rely on friends like the United States: our faithful ally has once again come to our assistance. Were it not for the American media, we would know nothing whatsoever about that mysterious night…’
The stoic silence of Israeli leaders, usually notorious for their verbosity, may not be as remarkable. The politicians, the disgruntled officers, people’s friends and cousins in the intelligence service and all the usual sources appear to operate normally. Rather, what seems to be taking place, is classic, tight-screwed censorship. As of the night of the attack, a strict injunction order was imposed on all Israeli media, under the Emergency Regulations of 1945 – British WWII orders granting the state extensive powers, which continue to exist side by side with normal statutory law. Any material, including translations from foreign sources and op-eds relating to the attack, was faxed for censorship prior to going on paper or online. Some things got through; many things did not.
‘This is infuriating,’ said one prominent columnist, who preferred to remain unnamed. ‘If they want to keep officials in the government, the army, even the judiciary quiet – fine. The real problem begins when they are shutting up people trying to voice opinions. I’m not allowed to say whether I think what Israel did in Syria is right or wrong. I’m not even allowed to say whether there is anything to be right or wrong about.’
‘The newspapers, as far as I’m aware, have not tried to appeal to the courts to lift the censorship – or even for permission to inform their readers that it’s actually there. The media is not keen to get sued every other day, and the censors are not too fond of court appearances; so a kind of a working relationship takes place. I don’t remember the military censors being significantly challenged on any point in recent years.’
‘The Israeli media already knows what happened,’ says military expert Dr Reuven Pedatzur of Tel Aviv University. ‘They can’t write anything, because the censorship is very strict. I have no explanation for why it is so tight – normally Israel likes to brag about its military – but it’s very obviously there. If you read the papers carefully, you can see they’re dropping clues.’
One such article, by Amir Oren, Ha’aretz”>appeared in Ha’aretz. Blaming Ehud Barak’s well-known fondness for silence and secrecy, he wrote: ‘…With a single order strictly enforced over civilians and soldiers alike, the entire country has become Sayeret Matkal [the General Staff’s elite special-operations forces that Barak once commanded]. […] Ironically, Israeli military censors claim that it is the very credibility of the Israeli press and its reporters in the eyes of hostile regimes that vindicates preventing the press from publishing views – not facts.’
Speaking to Index, Mr Oren sounds just as circumspect, saying he does not wish to detail beyond what he had written in the article. Asked whether there is a sweeping injuction on the subject, he replies: ‘Injunction orders nowadays have a final clause prohibiting their own publication; I can’t really answer that.’
The Israel Defense Forces declined to comment on this story.
(more…)
3 Jul 2007 | Comment, News
How many times is Israel going to make an example of Mordechai Vanunu? He was released from prison in 2004 after serving 18 years – much of it in solitary confinement. He has just been jailed again for ‘talking to foreigners’. The stringent terms of his release three years ago forbade him from having any contact with foreigners and from leaving the country.
Vanunu was first jailed, in 1986, for revealing information about Israel’s nuclear programme to the Sunday Times. If one follows the logic of Israel’s latest actions, the implication is that Vanunu remains a danger to national security. More than 20 years on, his knowledge of Israel’s nuclear capability is apparently so acute that he cannot be trusted to have any contact with foreigners, and can certainly not be allowed to go abroad, where he might spread all kinds of top secret information. Israel’s nuclear technology has, apparently, not advanced since the moment Vanunu was kidnapped by Mossad in Rome.
According to Vanunu’s lawyer, there was no suggestion in the prosecution that there had been any breach of state security: he was jailed for breaching the conditions of his release.
Israel continues to maintain an extraordinary fiction around its nuclear capability – more than 50 years since Shimon Peres, Israel’s new president, first did a deal with the French to build a nuclear reactor. Peres himself has acknowledged this, but last year, when Israel’s Prime Minister Ehud Olmert publicly confirmed in an interview that Israel has nuclear weapons, his aides were quick to step in and say that he hadn’t actually meant what he’d said. Vanunu is partly a victim of this continuing farce. Israel is also clearly bent on making an example of him in seeking to condemn him to a life of eternal punishment.
Mordechai Vanunu wants to live a normal life, as a free man. It’s time for Israel to cease its persecution and give him his freedom.
1 Aug 1982 | Magazine, Magazine Editions, Volume 11.04 August 1982
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9 Feb 2026 | Asia and Pacific, Australia, Israel, Middle East and North Africa, News, Palestine
Australia has been described as having some of the “democratic world’s most draconian anti-protest laws” after a state government invoked special powers ahead of the Israeli president’s visit on Monday.
On the first day of Herzog’s visit, there have been reports of police using pepper spray on protesters in Sydney, as hundreds tried to march despite protest restrictions, as well as in Victoria, where demonstrations were also held.
Nationwide demonstrations were set to take place against the five-day visit of Isaac Herzog, who a UN commission of enquiry found incited genocide against Palestinians, in what was described in the lead-up as the most potentially divisive state visit since the peak of the Vietnam War. [Editor’s note: the role of president in Israel is largely ceremonial and executive power is vested in the Cabinet and the Prime Minister.] The demonstrations come after Australia’s Prime Minister Anthony Albanese invited Herzog to visit, following December’s terrorist attack at Bondi Beach, during which two gunmen killed 15 people and injured 40.
To “help manage the visit safely and responsibly”, the New South Wales (NSW) government declared Herzog’s visit a major event under the Major Events Act 2009, it announced over the weekend. The declaration is usually reserved for sporting events.
On Monday afternoon Sydney time, the Palestine Action Group lost a court challenge against the special powers given to NSW police by the state government.
The extra powers allow police to order people to move on, shut certain locations and give lawful directions to prevent disruption or risk to public safety. They insisted they didn’t ban protests or marches and people could still “retain the right to express their views lawfully”. But anyone who fails to comply risks a fine of up to $5,500 or exclusion from the major event area.
Greg Barns, spokesman for the Australian Lawyers Alliance (ALA), a not-for-profit national association of lawyers, academics and other professionals, told Index that governments in Australia had legislation allowing police to regulate protest activities which “ostensibly” seek to balance freedom of speech with community safety.
“It is highly unusual to prevent protests, or severely restrict their scope when a foreign leader visits Australia,” he said. “Famously in the 1960s there were large protests in Sydney against US President Lyndon Johnson.”
He added that because Australia didn’t protect freedom of speech in its constitution, it was easier for governments to pass legislation prohibiting protests.
According to news reports, police ordered an issue to a man in Bondi to move on, after he climbed onto an electrical box and screamed at Herzog’s motorcade. He complied with the direction. Police said two others displaying placards in Bondi were given move on orders under the Summary Offences Act, which they also obeyed.
Professor Ben Saul, the UN special rapporteur on human rights and counter terrorism, said on X on Monday: “Australia now has some of the democratic world’s most draconian anti-protest laws. Today a man was arrested as an ‘agitator’ simply for peacefully yelling ‘shame’ in the direction of the visiting Israeli President, on the basis it may have ‘incited’ fear”.”
Meanwhile NSW premier Chris Minns said: “This is about keeping people safe, lowering the temperature and ensuring Sydney remains calm and orderly.”
Palestine Action Group Sydney accused Minns of a “scare campaign” and said on their Facebook page that it was “absolutely lawful” for people to gather to protest, as they encouraged protesters to gather at Sydney’s Town Hall for a march.
“The streets of Sydney belong to the people, not to the head of a genocidal state,” they said.
Just a week after the Bondi attack, NSW Parliament passed The Terrorism and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2025, which allows the state’s police commissioner or deputy commissioner with the police minister to restrict authorised assemblies in specific areas for 14 days after a terrorism declaration.
“This is designed to deter divisive, inflammatory public assemblies which put community safety and cohesion at risk in the immediate aftermath of an attack,” the NSW government said on 24 December.
After a declaration, no public assemblies are allowed in designated areas. Police can move people on if their behaviour or presence obstructs traffic or causes fear, harassment or intimidation, they said.
The notice can be extended by two-week periods for up to three months. It does not prevent quiet reflection, prayer or peaceful gatherings, the government said. However, a video has emerged of police seemingly dispersing Muslims praying during the protests.
In early February, the Public Assembly Restriction Declaration (PARD) was extended for two weeks until 17 February, restricting public assemblies in Sydney’s eastern suburbs area, which includes Bondi, and parts of the city.
Critics of the law including Greens MPs have described Minns as pro-Israel and said that it was clear he was targeting pro-Palestine protesters, including those opposing Herzog’s visit, with the moves.
An NSW parliamentary review into hate speech has also recommended the state government introduce legislation banning the phrase “globalise the intifada”.
With several days of Herzog’s visit left, it remains to be seen whether those opposing the Israeli president’s visit will have the opportunity to raise their voices, and whether they can do so safely.
