the articles below show without argument the tragedy that is the australian press when it is 70% owned by that internationalist capitalist and self-appointed ‘king-maker’, rupert murdoch. he lifted gough whitlam up in 1972, more for his dislike of then pm billy mcmahon, but tore him down in 1975 ably assisted by american interests. the first article,in the guardian, an english newspaper, washes over any real input of seriousness as to the event itself and this is then questioned by journalist celeste liddle. i totally agree with her analysis.
had this happened to a group of caucasian australians then asio and the federal police would have been all over every muslim group they could harass. our media tends to make our issues only front page news on aboriginal matters when it can be spun into a report whereby all those lazy, drunken, etc, etc, can be blamed for the mistakes of government and their departments.
Subject: The Guardian: Explosive injures four in Aboriginal community near
Broome
Explosive injures four in Aboriginal community near Broome
An ignited object was thrown from a car and then exploded, injuring four people, including a 13-year-old girl
Bridie Jabour
theguardian.com, Thursday 29 August 2013 12.07 AEST
An explosive which injured four people who were socialising in an indigenous community near Broome, including a 13-year-old girl, has left police mystified at the motive.
The explosive was thrown at a group of several people about 7pm on Tuesday night from a car in the Western Australian Aboriginal community of One Mile on the outskirts of Broome.
A 43-year-old woman picked up the projectile – which is believed to be a firecracker – and it exploded in her hands. She was airlifted to Perth for emergency surgery with hand and leg injuries.
Two other people, one of them the 13-year-old girl, suffered damage to their sight and hearing but have since being released from hospital. A fourth person, a man, hurt his back as he tried to run away from the attack.
Detective Jeremy Spivey from Broome police station said there were no suspects and police still did not have a motive for the attack.
“It’s not common,” he said.
“We have had no similar incidents or events, it’s very isolated.”
Spivey said police believed the explosive was a firecracker but they still have not confirmed it.
Police have interviewed a number of witnesses and are asking anyone who saw people handling firecrackers in the past few days to come forward.
fire crackers!? must have been one huge bunger. probably made of semtex. lots of mining around broome with easy access to mining explosives. the coppers seem to have given up already, despite the level of injuries caused.
this just sounds suss to me.
fkj
Bloody suss alright.
Police don’t do “mystified” in these situations. They either know who did it, or don’t want to know.
Same old same old where attacks on Aboriginal people are concerned.
Like Alabama or any small town in Australia in the 60s. Bloody disgraceful.
Laurie
Broome bombing: where is the outrage?
If the attack had happened in an affluent part of Australia, there would be coast-to-coast coverage for days. The lack of media reports on a story affecting Indigenous people is telling
- Celeste Liddle
- theguardian.com, Friday 30 August 2013 10.54 AEST
On Tuesday evening, an explosive was hurled from a car into a small Aboriginal community near Broome, Western Australia, injuring four people. One woman had to be flown to Perth for emergency surgery, and three other people sustained spinal, hearing and eyesight injuries.
A small local news report details that One Mile Aboriginal Community residents witnessed a car driving through the community slowly before pitching something out of the window. Police investigations are still continuing, although it has been suggested that the attack may have been “a prank that’s gone seriously wrong”. I admit to being sceptical this attack was just a “prank” – the target seems quite specific. As investigations are underway, my speculations on what the motives were and who is most likely responsible shall end here.
What I do wish to know, however, is where is the media and Australian community outrage over this event? Where is the coast-to-coast coverage? If I was not hooked into social media, where a number of Indigenous community members were talking about it, I probably would have missed the story due to the lack of coverage. It is telling that the Chinese national press agency Xinhua covered it, yet most of the Australian sources failed to mention it. Last year, when I was told at work that the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union had been the target of a bomb threat, I was able to read about it in a variety of sources. That one turned out to be a hoax; this attack actually injured four people.
Had this been an attack on an Australian city, or on a group of non-Indigenous people, would it have been deemed an event of public importance? As Aboriginal feminist and activist The Koori Woman so eloquently writes: “(I’m) Idly wondering what would happen if I went and casually lobbed an explosive down the whitest street in the village”.
Others queried why, in similar circumstances, labels such as “potential hate crime” or “terrorist attack” are usually used, but in this instance the event is downplayed to a “possible prank”. Is it because the people who have been harmed are not valued by a huge section of the Australian public, and therefore it is felt that people won’t respond to the news? Or is it more insidious than this, and many Australians would make the assumption that the victims of this attack are actually guilty by virtue of their race and their location, and have therefore somehow brought it upon themselves?
It is telling that news from Indigenous communities rarely gets covered unless the government is calling for a “national emergency” to justify deploying defence forces into communities, or if it involves an Aboriginal person who has achieved celebrity status. It is also telling that on the rare occasions when we hear about violence on the communities, it tends to focus on internal community violence and not violence perpetuated upon a community by outsiders.
I have to wonder whether the community members feel they even have the right to report crimes perpetrated against them. In Western Australia, 42% of the prison population is Aboriginal; more than 11 times what the Western Australian prison population parity rate would be. These racialised imprisonment rates cannot possibly foster a faith in the justice system, particularly for small community people. They are vulnerable, and most of the country appear to not be interested.
My thoughts are with the One Mile community and the families that have been affected by this act. I hope that there is justice for these victims as they struggle to make sense of it. And to social media users who refused to let this story about a crime perpetuated against people living on an outback Aboriginal community be ignored, thank you.
- fkj
- ray jackson
president
indigenous social justice association
isja01
(m) 0450 651 063
(p) 02 9318 0947
address 1303/200 pitt street waterloo 2017
we live and work on the stolen lands of the gadigal people.
sovereignty treaty social justice
