Transcription
The organizers of Sydney's pro-Palestinian protest have defended the march, saying it was an incredible event. Pablo Vinales is in Sydney with the details. And Pablo, what's been the reaction to yesterday's march?
Katherine, well, the turnout to that historic march over the Sydney Harbor Bridge yesterday, far exceeded even the organizers' expectations. Almost 100,000 people walking over the harbor bridge to highlight the humanitarian crisis in Gaza. The event yesterday has made international headlines in Israel, in the UK, and in the United States. And that was certainly the goal by the Palestine Action Group, the organizers of this event, of using this world-famous landmark as the backdrop to highlight their cause.
Among those who attended the protest yesterday's Labour MP Ed Husic, who this morning said that it was a wake-up call for Australian politicians in their response to what is happening in Gaza, that Australian politicians have underestimated the community sentiment around what many are seeing happening in the Middle East. We have also heard from the Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, who spoke a little bit earlier. Yesterday's march was peaceful and was an opportunity for people to express their concern about what is happening in Gaza and the images that we've seen. It's not surprising that so many Australians have been affected in order to want to show their concern.
Now, Israel's Foreign Minister Gideon Sa'ar has also weighed in on X. He has posted an image of what appears to be a protester holding a photo of Iran's Supreme Leader. And on X he has said, "The distorted alliance between the radical left and fundamentalist Islam is sadly dragging the West toward the sidelines of history." And he has told Australians to wake up.
Now, we have also heard from the New South Wales Premier Chris Minns today, who was against this protest going ahead even before the court action took place at the weekend. Chris Minns saying that he was concerned around public safety. Let's take a listen to what he had to say.
"Firstly, it was a massive crowd, over a 100,000 people. And if the weather wasn't appalling, I think it would have even been bigger than that, maybe even double the size. So, there's no doubt there was a massive community demonstration, huge. Um, from the perspective of Sydney, a lot of people were concerned about the situation in Gaza and had incredible empathy and concern about Palestinian children in particular, but the entire situation."
That was Chris Minns there, speaking earlier today, the New South Wales Premier. Pablo, what have the organizers had to say about the march?
Well, we heard earlier from Josh Lee from the Palestine Action Group, who is hailing this as a massive success. There were some points during that protest yesterday where police said that they feared the worst, given the amount of people that were crossing the bridge, around 90,000 people, and at the points of when they were going to return, having crossed to the northern end and then returning back into the CBD. Police said that at some points it became perilous. They were concerned of a crowd crush as people tried to return. I was at the protest yesterday. There were points where it was confusing. Police messages were going out saying that it had stopped, that then that they would facilitate the return in a controlled way.
Though Josh Lee says that overall this has been a massive success, that it has really highlighted the message and it shows the sentiment in the community. We heard in the run-up to this demonstration from Chris Minns, from the Deputy Police Commissioner and so on, that this would be chaos, that this couldn't be done, couldn't possibly be done safely. Well, this has all been proven utterly false. Instead, what we saw was an immense and perfectly safe and wonderful day without a single arrest, without a single even scuffle or anything. So, this was an incredible day, which everyone who took part should be so proud that they were there on that day to send this message to the world.
Now, Kath, given the result from the New South Wales Supreme Court, of course, it refused the police application for that prohibition order for this protest. New South Wales Premier Chris Minns says that the government is now looking at what this means, whether it sets a precedent, and whether there is the need for legislation or regulation to try and address this. The Palestine Action Group says though it has no plans anytime soon to hold such a demonstration over the bridge anytime soon.
K. Pablo Vignales, thank you.