The Australian Labor government, like its imperialist counterparts internationally, has backed Israel’s unprovoked assault on Iran, while legitimising the Trump administration’s preparations for a catastrophic all-out war on Tehran.
This is a continuation of the Labor’s support for the US-funded Israeli rampage throughout the Middle East over the past 19 months. It has defended the Zionist regime’s mass slaughter of Palestinians in Gaza and its repeated attacks on Lebanon, Syria, Yemen and Iran.
All of these illegal operations have been part of an overarching plan to establish a “new Middle East,” completely dominated by Washington, which has long regarded Iran as the chief obstacle to its ambitions in the region and the necessary preparation for a US-led war with China.
Yet, Labor is turning reality on its head, tacitly presenting Israel as an aggrieved party and Iran as a threat to “regional peace.”
In comments yesterday, Foreign Minister Penny Wong declared: “What we want to see is this situation resolved by Iran’s actions. Iran must come to the table.”
Repeating word for word Israel’s justification for its attacks on Iran, Wong continued: “Iran must stop any nuclear program—that is the fastest way out of danger for the globe, for the region and for the Iranian people.”
These comments dispense with Wong’s earlier calls for “all sides” to show “restraint” and to “de-escalate” and parrot US and Israeli propaganda that blames Iran for Israel’s naked war of aggression. This takes place as Trump is preparing for a direct US attack on Iran and signals that the Australian government will be on board.
The real dangers for the region and the globe lie with US imperialism and its proxy, Israel, which has been carrying out the genocidal slaughter of Palestinians in Gaza and air attacks throughout the region.
The hypocrisy is staggering. Wong’s call for Iran to return to the negotiating table ignores the fact that Trump’s call for talks was simply a ruse to lull the Iranian regime into complacency as Israel carried out its massive surprise attack against Iranian military and nuclear targets, and killed top military and civilian officials.
Among those assassinated was a leading Iranian nuclear negotiator, making clear neither Israel nor the US is interested in bona fide negotiations.
As for nuclear weapons, Iran has none. The US intelligence assessment, made public in March, concluded that Iran did not have either the capacity or desire to create a nuclear weapon in the foreseeable future.
Yet Israel, which has never signed the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty and has refused any oversight by the International Atomic Energy Agency, has a significant nuclear arsenal estimated to be at least 90 warheads—a fact rarely mentioned in the establishment media.
An assessment by international legal expert Marko Milanovic republished by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) this week made clear Israel was committing an act of aggression and flouting international law in open violation of the United Nations Charter.
Milanovic stated the obvious fact that “there is simply no plausible way of arguing that Iran was about to attack Israel with a nuclear weapon, which it doesn’t even possess… Even if the broadest possible (legally plausible) understanding of anticipatory self-defence was taken as a correct, Israel’s use of force against Iran would be illegal.”
Labor government ministers are dodging around the question of Australian military support for or participation in a US-led war on Iran.
Asked on ABC television last night, Defence Minister Richard Marles tried to present Australia as an uninvolved party and refused to say whether the US would be permitted to launch missions from military bases in northern Australia.
In reality, Australia would be automatically involved through the provision of intelligence and targeting data from the US spy base at Pine Gap in central Australia and other facilities. As part of the US build-up to war against China, US access to air and naval bases in northern and western Australia have vastly expanded.
The Australian military and its bases have already been involved in the expanding US-Israeli war in the Middle East. Last October, the Defence Department admitted that Australian air bases had facilitated long-range US attacks by B-2 stealth bombers on Houthi forces in Yemen.
Australian military officials and specialists have been deployed to US military command in the Middle East to aid the assault on Yemen.
To imagine that the Labor government would refuse US demands for logistic and combat support for a war against Iran is absurd. Labor has backed Washington’s illegal wars of aggression against Iraq and Afghanistan as well as its military and CIA operations in Libya and Syria.
Right now, Labor is desperate to ensure that the Trump administration’s review of the AUKUS military pact between the US, the UK and Australia does not conclude that the deal to sell nuclear submarines to the Australian Navy be torn up.
The review was unveiled in the immediate aftermath of a demand by US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth, that Australia immediately lift its military spending from around 2 to 3.5 percent of GDP—an increase of tens of billions a year.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese was scheduled to have his first face-to-face meeting with Trump on the sidelines of the G7 Summit in Canada this week. It would have undoubtedly focused on shoring up AUKUS as well as making forlorn appeals for an exemption to US tariffs.
Albanese has assiduously avoided making any criticisms of any of Trump’s actions whether it be his tariff war or his administration’s open moves towards dictatorship, mobilizing the military on the streets against national-wide protests and nakedly breaching the American constitution and laws.
Albanese also said not a word against the onslaught on Iran. Instead, he continually emphasised the US alliance and his desire to collaborate with Trump. That is yet another signal of the Labor government's full support for the agenda of authoritarianism and war, not only abroad, but domestically too.
Albanese did not get his sideline meeting with Trump, after the US president left the G7 Summit early to huddle with top generals and officials in the White House Situation Room to plan military operations against Iran.
Australia is already deeply involved in US war plans, preparation and provocations against China. As reported by the Australian, Marles told its “Defending Australia” summit on Monday that Australia “would play a key role if war broke out between the US and China. ‘Our continent is more relevant to great power contest now than it’s ever been before.’”
What is unfolding is a global war that is already underway against Russia in Ukraine, has just been dramatically escalated in the Middle East against Iran and is in an advanced stage of preparation against China. Marles chillingly told the summit these were not distant questions, of decades away. They are “in the here and now.”
As a third world war looms, the Australian military is completely integrated with American forces. The Labor government, which has lined up with the US-backed Israeli genocide, will not only continue to politically back the US-led war of aggression against Iran, but will provide any military support that is demanded by the Trump administration.