Activists staged a blockade outside of the United States Embassy in South Melbourne on November 27 to protest the United States and Australia’s role in supporting Israel’s war on Gaza.
Several activists, who had locked themselves onto temporary fencing, were arrested by Victorian Police. “We will free Palestine within our lifetime,” they chanted. Another activist used a lock-on device to blockade the tram lines along St Kilda Road during peak hour.
The message was there can be no business as usual while Israel is still ethnically cleansing Palestinians.
Meanwhile a community-led blockade is underway at Pine Gap, a joint US and Australian defence intelligence facility near Alice Springs.
Pine Gap collects and analyses surveillance data from Palestine to aid Israel in its carpet bombing of Gaza.
The group is calling for Pine Gap to be closed. They said their action helps draw attention to the fact that US “aid” to Israel from 1951 to 2022 totals $158 billion – the largest given to any country.
The US gives $3.8 million in military aid to Israel annually — about 16% of Israel’s military budget.
Meanwhile, the Australian government has approved hundreds of military exports to Israel every year under one of the most secretive, unaccountable weapons’ export industries in the world.
The blockades are part of a growing number of protests in solidarity with Palestinians which are bringing record-breaking numbers into the streets around the world.