The Morrison government suspects a state Labor government may have leaked a secret ASIO briefing that warned the Prime Minister’s mooted shift on recognising Jerusalem as the capital of Israel could provoke unrest and violence in Palestinian territories.
The leak to Guardian Australia of the memo stating that any announcement of a possible relocation of Australia’s embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem “may provoke protest, unrest and possibly some violence in Gaza and the West Bank” is now being investigated by the Australian Federal Police.
The political temperature continued to rise on Thursday over the issues of Israel and Iran, with federal Labor accusing the government of chaos that was damaging Australia abroad, and Prime Minister Scott Morrison labelling recent behaviour by elements of the NSW Labor Party “anti-Semitic”.
The ASIO note added that Australia’s changes to policy on Israel and Iran could attract protest directly against Australian interests overseas or even within Australia though in the latter case “we have no information to indicate such protest would be violent”.
After Labor questioned Mr Morrison over the leak, the Prime Minister told Parliament that ASIO “as a matter of routine practice provides this advice to Commonwealth and state governments
on security matters” – placing a particular vocal emphasis on “state governments”.