Hate speech laws criminalising violent threats against racial or religious groups could be in force within weeks, as Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus rejects claims that the Albanese Government’s policies on Israel have fuelled a surge in anti-Semitism. Source: The Age.
Mr Dreyfus, who returned from a six-day diplomatic mission to Israel on Monday, confirmed that the Australian Federal Police was investigating whether overseas criminal groups had paid Australians to commit anti-Semitic attacks.
AFP commissioner Reece Kershaw made a significant intervention into the discussion on anti-Semitism by saying “criminals for hire” could be behind some recent attacks on Jewish sites, a suggestion backed by Prime Minister Anthony Albanese yesterday.
Mr Dreyfus said: “It’s one line of inquiry that has come up for some of these incidents.”
He said introducing criminal penalties for hate speech would be a major priority when parliament resumed in February, arguing the laws would combat anti-Semitism by “lowering the temperature in Australia”.
Mr Dreyfus’s proposal would criminalise threatening violence against racial or religious groups, as well as threats motivated by gender identity or sexual orientation, but stop short of outlawing vilification and ridicule, thereby avoiding some of the trickier free speech debates.
Shadow attorney-general Michaelia Cash said this week that the Opposition wanted to work with the Government to pass hate speech laws, calling on the Government to strengthen the legislation to criminalise the urging or threatening of attacks against places of worship.
Mr Dreyfus, who is Jewish, said the rise of “shocking” and “abhorrent” anti-Semitic attacks in cities such as Sydney and Melbourne was the worst he had seen in his lifetime.
“It’s unacceptable, and it has to stop,” he said, pushing back on claims by the Coalition and Jewish community groups that the Government had moved too slowly to stamp out anti-Semitism after the October 7 attacks.
“Our Government has pulled all of the levers that it can to combat this scourge. It is called the world’s oldest hatred, and it is hard to stamp out.”
FULL STORY
‘We need to lower the temperature’: Hate speech laws could pass in February (By Matthew Knott, David Crowe and Paul Sakkal, The Age)
