Murdoch Likens Bandt to Hitler, Despite Netanyahu’s Best Efforts at Achieving the Title

To be labelled a Nazi, or even worse, likened to the figure of Adolf Hitler, are some of the gravest charges an individual can be labelled with. And that’s, to state the obvious, because under Hitler’s leadership, the Nazis perpetrated the Holocaust: a genocide against six million Jewish people.

So, it can be assumed that former lawyer Francis Galbally was well aware of the gravity of the argument he was making, in penning his article in The Australian last Friday, Australia’s Greens look increasingly like the National Socialist Workers’ Party, in which he likens Adam Bandt to Hitler.

But even though Galbally is coming at it from a 1930s pre-Holocaust context, as he accuses the Greens leader of borrowing from Hitler’s playbook in planning for an authoritarian future, it must be obvious to the ex-lawyer that if someone is cutting a Hitlerite figure right now, it’s not Bandt.

Hitler and his Nazi Party perpetrated the Holocaust over the period 1941 through to 1945, which was an attempt to exterminate the Jewish people of Europe. And right now, Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu, his Likud Party and others are perpetrating a genocide against Palestinians in Gaza.

So, whilst Bandt has recently been condemned for leading the only party in the Australian parliament railing against the Israeli-perpetrated genocide in Gaza, it would appear that the main figure on the world stage giving off a similar vibe to Adolf Hitler is, indeed, Benjamin Netanyahu.

Forgot to take his meds?

“Australians need to be very careful: the Greens are not what their name implies,” warns Galbally in his 14 June opinion piece. And he goes on to posit that just as the Nazis termed themselves “socialist” to attract the popular vote, so too is Bandt’s cabal hiding behind the term “green”.

“The Nazi Party was not socialist in terms of ideology or policies. The party advocated for extreme nationalism, antisemitism and a totalitarian state,” the former lawyer clarifies, and then makes the claim, “Australia’s Greens look increasingly like the National Socialist Workers’ Party.”

So, how is this the case?

Well, according to Francis, the name Greens “attracts young, mobile and relatively wealthy urban Australians”, who “want to fix the world”, so there “are good intentions”, but this is by no means the same Greens party Bob Brown once led. And certainly not with this Bandt guy in charge.

Bandt’s Greens are like Hitler’s Nazis in the 1930s. “Both leaders are ideologues and demagogues”, and they’re both “antisemitic”.  Hitler is antisemitic, one would gather, because he led the Holocaust. But in Bandt’s case, he appears to be because he opposes a genocide against Palestinians.

Galbally then asserts that Bandt supports the weekly pro-Palestinian demonstrations in the nation’s capitals, which aren’t just “antisemitic”, but are getting to the point where they’re “frighteningly similar to those pre-Nuremberg rallies in Munich in the 1920s”.

Brother by another mother

Hitler outlines in his 1925 autobiography Mein Kampf how he came to be antisemitic. He and the Nazis then took authoritarian control of Germany, invaded neighbouring countries, and attempted to systematically wipe out Jewish people, creating a whole infrastructure to commit the genocide.

Galbally asserts that Bandt is antisemitic as he encourages the chant “from the river to the sea”. However, the ex-lawyer fails to mention that Netanyahu’s Likud Party’s 1977 founding document asserts that “between the Sea and the Jordan there will only be Israeli sovereignty”.

And in writing his opinion piece, the Australian lawyer fails to discuss that since early last October, Netanyahu has been overseeing a massive military assault upon the Palestinians living in the Gaza Strip, which has entailed carpet bombings, ground invasions and enforced starvation of all.

Palestinians are semitic peoples. Netanyahu has been constantly demonising them as “monsters”, however. And on Christmas Eve 2023, the Israeli PM stated that the assault on Gaza “is a battle not only of Israel against these barbarians, it’s a battle of civilization against barbarism”.

The Israeli state has exterminated anywhere between 38,000 and 45,000 Palestinians, if not more, since last October. And the overwhelming majority of these people have been civilians, with about 70 percent of the death toll accounting for children and women.

Since taking office in late 2022, the current Netanyahu government is comprised of a coalition of far-right parties that have not only led a genocide in Gaza, which is increasingly being perpetrated in the West Bank as well, but internally, it’s enforcing authoritarian rule in the domestic sphere.

Hitler was an authoritarian leader who carried out a genocide against semitic people. Netanyahu is a current authoritarian leader, who, right now, is perpetrating a genocide against semitic people.

The International Court of Justice has ruled that the evidence before it, leads it to consider Netanyahu is plausibly committing this genocide.

Hiding their own tendencies

So, now we’ve established that Galbally has attempted to equate Bandt to Hitler, whilst neglecting to mention the genocide in the room, his ravings do appear to be from someone who’s attempting to dismiss the fact that Netanyahu is currently perpetrating the worst atrocity since World War II.

Key points during “Bandt’s rant” at a recent Melbourne antigenocide protest that resemble the “hallmarks of a Nazi rally”, include his showing support for the protest movement, calling for the ambassador of a nation perpetrating a genocide to be expelled and wanting the genocide to end.

And Galbally also raised the charges that genocide-excusing PM Anthony Albanese laid against the Greens over recent attacks on Labor MP offices, as he stated that Bandt’s support of protesting at electoral offices bears all “the hallmarks of a potential dictator slowly cutting away at democracy”.

“Instead of sanctioning Benjamin Netanyahu and his extremist government, or ending the two-way arms trade between Australia and Israel, Labor has backed the invasion,” Bandt told Sydney Criminal Lawyers, in regard to questions about his party being charged as responsible for the office attacks.

“They have clutched at straws in an attempt to distract the community from their failure to put any pressure on the Israeli government over the atrocities we’re witnessing in Gaza,” the Greens leader said, in a manner that didn’t convey he’s planning an authoritarian takeover of the country.

Bandt further added that in charging the Greens with coordinating attacks on the officers of Labor MPs, simply marks both major parties attempting to deflect from strong community calls for the government to step up to condemn the genocide and end the two-way trade in weapons with Israel.

“The UN special rapporteur has said that when war crimes are taking place, governments like Australia’s have a responsibility to take action to stop them,” Bandt said in concluding, in his most autocratic manner.

“That’s what we need right now – action. Not more weasel words and distractions.”