Supporting genocide but in a girlboss way

Penny Wong was in Israel and the West Bank last week doing some diplomacy, which is where you repeat the phrase “Israel has the right to defend itself but the way it does so matters” until hopefully you wake up.

Wong’s public statements since the bombardment began are obviously the product of a decision inside Labor to “strike a balance” between saying as little as possible while keeping everyone who’s pissed off about this in the tent for another election cycle. Wong herself is a master at saying nothing while sounding smart — Aaron Patrick at the Fin Review called it “her exquisite ability to use the English language to avoid communication”.

Anyone who is not a Press Gallery journalist is thoroughly unimpressed by this shtick as the rolling car crash that is Wong’s social media presence will tell you. In her tweets about her Israel trip, Wong said that “Australia wants to see more urgent action to protect civilian lives … increased and unimpeded humanitarian access in Gaza” [and] “a just and enduring peace which meets Israel’s security needs and Palestinian aspirations for statehood.”

Anyway here’s Benjamin Netanyahu yesterday:

Wong is acting out a farce that the Western political and diplomatic corps has had down pat for a long time. The Israeli government understands that Western politicians will go through the motions of “raising concerns” about the war on Gaza, the aid embargo, the genocidal language, the illegal settlements and everything else, and that absolutely no consequences will follow when it ignores this concern-raising and keeps doing exactly what it’s always done. When Joe Biden says that a two-state solution is still possible Netanyahu now comes out ten minutes later and says “no it’s not” and the response from the sitting President of the United States is “okay here are some more bombs”.