We post this excerpt from Chris Hedges speech in Adelaide at the Edward Said Memorial lecture after he was banned by the Australian Press Club.
We asked peace activist, Ciaron O’Reilly what he thought of Chris Hedges. The reply: “Good guy, great orater, good politics (identifies as a Christian Anarchist!). Very supportive of Julian (Assange). Thanks to Counter Punch for publishing the speech (link to full text below).
The Gaza, the one that existed on the morning of October 7 is gone, decimated by months of saturation bombing, shelling, bulldozing and controlled demolitions. All that was familiar when I worked in Gaza has vanished, transformed into an apocalyptic landscape of shattered concrete and rubble.
My New York Times office in the center of Gaza City. The Marna boarding house on Ahmed Abd el-Aziz Street, where after a day’s work I would drink tea with Margaret Nassar, the elderly woman who owned it, a refugee from Safad in northern Galilee. On my last visit to Marna House, I forgot to return the room key. Number 12. It was attached to a large plastic oval with the words “Marna House Gaza” on it. The key sits on my desk. Friends and colleagues, with few exceptions, are in exile, dead or, in most cases, have disappeared, no doubt buried under mountains of debris. The daily rituals of life in Gaza are no longer possible. I used to leave my shoes on a rack by the front door of the Great Omari Mosque, the largest and oldest mosque in Gaza, in the Daraj Quarter of the Old City.
The white stone walls had pointed arches and a tall octagonal minaret encircled by a carved wooden balcony that was crowned with a crescent. The mosque was built on the foundations of ancient temples to Philistine and Roman deities as well as a Byzantine church. I washed my hands, face and feet at the common water taps, carrying out the ritual purification before prayer, known as wudhu. Inside the hushed interior with its blue-carpeted floor, the cacophony, noise, dust, fumes and frenetic pace of Gaza melted away. The mosque was destroyed on December 8, 2023, by an Israeli airstrike.
The razing of Gaza is not only a crime against the Palestinian people. It is a crime against our cultural and historical heritage — an assault on memory. We cannot understand the present, especially when reporting on Palestinians and Israelis, if we do not understand the past. There is no shortage of failed peace plans in occupied Palestine, all of them incorporating detailed phases and timelines, going back to the presidency of Jimmy Carter. See https://www.counterpunch.org/2025/10/22/requiem-for-gaza/
Brisbane City Council has fined Justice for Palestine Magan-djin 🇵🇸 activists $5,000 for speaking in Brisbane’s City Mall. They were speaking out against Israeli attacks on the Sumud flotilla, bringing aid to Gaza.
Business and local government complicit in genocide
Brisbane’s mall business managers and Lord Mayor Adrian Schrinner are suspects in complicity by imposing fines on activists’ right to organise against genocide.
The ICJ ruled yesterday that Israel’s blocking aid from UNWRA into Gaza is unlawful.
The infringement notices issued to the three activists claim they made:
1. FAIL TO OBTAIN CONSENT TO DELIVER A PUBLIC ADDRESS IN A MALL
2. FAIL TO OBTAIN CONSENT TO OPERATE NOISE EMITTING TOOLS, MACHINERY OR AMPLIFYING DEVICE IN OR ABUTTING A MALL
One of the activists was trying to bring people’s attention to the complicity of Australians in the IDF murdering people bringing aid on the Mavi Marmara in 2010. Similar actions were taken by Israel just a couple of weeks ago blocking the Sumud flotilla.
Given that none of this has found itself into the mainstream media surely it is important that people raise it in the only way possible out on the streets in the mall so people can understand the depths of Australian complicity.
Attacks on free speech in the Brisbane Mall are as old as the mall itself.
Free Speech in Queen Street Mall
The first person jailed was Sean O’Reilly in October 1982. His “community decided on a daily vigil outside the prison. They also decided to commit themselves to a daily vigil whenever a dissident was imprisoned for exercising free expression. Over the following year, this was to amount to 14 weeks of daily vigils involving many libertarians, as there were 12 occurrences of dissidents being imprisoned. The vigils included a “Free All Political Prisoners” banner and a plea to passing traffic to “Honk for Free Expression.”
These attacks must stop. This recent action underlines the deep complicity of business and politicians in Israel’s genocide.
Surely there must be some authorities who will not stoop so low as to support murder and starvation of Palestinians in Gaza?
The BCC officer who wrote the infringement notices may be of the pentecostal faith and may even believe their salvation depends on Israel. But that does not absolve them or Adrian Schrinner of complicity in genocide. Just who is this Lord Mayor, openly Zionist, attempting to make BCC a theocracy in support of the chosen prople?
How bizarre the Liberal Party has become, so estranged from the electorate that they had the largest ever landslide against them in the last federal election.
Today I received a reply from Adrian Schrinner in response to my letter asking Council to light up the Story Bridge in the Palestinian colours as a mark of respect of the suffering of the Palestinian peopleover the past two years. In refusing my request, he claimed that that the Palestinian flag didn’t meet ‘eligibility requirements’. He went on to say: ” I’m pleased to share that on Tuesday, 14 October 2025, Council assets across Brisbane were lit white to recognise the momentous peace deal in the Middle East and the hostages returning home.”
It is real hypocrisy for the Lord Mayor to talk of peace while he is trying to impose penalties on Palestinian activists seeking justice for a people suffering starvation and genocide at the hands of the Israelis.
Ian Curr
24 October 2025
The second largest exporter of weapons to Israel after the United States is Germany . Palestine action have shut down Hamburg it’s largest port .
https://substack.com/@nourim/note/c-174609164?r=2qgvh4&utm_medium=ios