Australians can condemn repression in Iran and still focus on Gaza, where our government’s leverage is real and our moral responsibility is direct.

In his discussion of the conflict in Kosovo, Noam Chomsky outlined three broad principles:

These principles can be invoked again today in response to claims that those who have campaigned to criticise Israel and end its genocide in Gaza have been conspicuously absent from the streets in support of protestors in Iran confronting the repressive apparatus of that state.

Interestingly, there is an implicit acceptance here of the killings in Gaza from those demanding consistency about human rights violations in both places. It places the anti-demonstrators in a quandary. Israel’s supporters can’t seem to decide between denying that mass civilian deaths have occurred (“Hamas propaganda”) and justifying them as self-defence (“what else could we have done?”).

For brevity we can put to one side the extent to which the protests in Iran have been aided and abetted by agent provocateurs and Western intelligence agents on the ground. Whatever happens, the legitimacy of a new political dispensation in the........

© Pearls and Irritations