Gaza refugee ban: Peter Dutton calls to stop intake from ‘that war zone’

Opposition Leader Peter Dutton has been accused of seeking to further divide the community after calling for a stop to migration from Gaza, saying refugees fleeing “that war zone” were putting national security at risk.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Immigration Minister Tony Burke defended the security checks in place, and the agencies responsible for administering them during a testy question time on Wednesday.

Labor argued the vetting process had not changed since the Coalition was in government.

It comes as the Albanese government works to establish a new permanent visa scheme for Palestinian refugees, and follows comments by ASIO boss Mike Burgess at the weekend that support for Hamas would not automatically disqualify anyone fleeing the war-zone coming to Australia.

Coalition MPs wrote to Mr Burke on Tuesday, demanding that no known supporters of Hamas - a listed terrorist organisation - be allowed to enter Australia as part of the new scheme, before Mr Dutton went a step further on Wednesday morning.

He said Australians would be “shocked” to know the Government was “bringing in people from a war zone”, and accused ASIO of not conducting proper checks and searches. Mr Burgess has repeated assurances security checks were being carried out.

“I don’t think people should be coming in through that war zone at all at the moment,” Mr Dutton told Sky News.

“It’s not prudent to do so, and I think it puts our national security at risk.”

Mr Burgess said on Sunday that while financial or material support for Hamas would automatically lead to a visa being rejected, sympathy or rhetorical support for the terrorist organisation would not have the same effect.

Mr Burgess also rejected suggestions corners were being cut on security checks for people fleeing Gaza.

During Question Time on Wednesday, Mr Burke assured the Coalition that every one of the 2922 Palestinian refugees who has been granted a visitor visa between October 7 and August 12 had gone through ASIO’s checks.

“Whether you come from the United States or whether you come from the Gaza Strip. And that’s through what ASIO will routinely refer to as their watch list, what is technically referred to as the movement alert list,” Mr Burke said.

“It is updated every 24 hours. With every name that ASIO puts forward that they are concerned about. Every single visa that has been issued by this government and by the previous government went through that check against ASIO’s information.”

He confirmed 7111 visa applications made by the cohort had been rejected since October 7.

Senate Opposition Leader Simon Birmingham said there was no confidence that full vetting was taking place on arrivals.

“Nobody should be coming here without full and thorough screening, particularly screening in relation to security issues when they’re coming from a terrorist controlled territory,” he said on Sky News.

“Now it’s evident from all of the advice and information to date that full, comprehensive, thorough screening is not possible to be done out of Gaza at this point in time.

“And the flow on from that is that we shouldn’t be processing people, and they shouldn’t be coming at this point in time until that sort of thorough checking can be done.”

The Coalition has not confirmed if it would seek to send refugees who’ve arrived in Australia back to the war zone if it were in government.

Mr Albanese said ASIO had the government’s full support, and called on the Coalition to come clean on whether or not it had confidence in the security agency.

“The ASIO Director General (oversees security assessments), and if the Leader of the Opposition doesn’t have confidence in the system, he should say so,” Mr Albanese said.

“It’s exactly the same system that was in place when the Leader of the Opposition was the Minister for Immigration, who resided over these issues.”

Labor warned against assuming every person who lived in Gaza was a member of, or supporter of, Hamas.

Mr Albanese reminded the Coalition of comments Mr Burgess made last week, when he raised the domestic terror threat level, that “there is a direct link between inflamed language and inflamed tension and violence”.

“I seek to bring people together, this bloke’s always looking for an opportunity to create division, which is what his off the cuff comments were about today - they didn’t even go to shadow cabinet or their caucus, or any proper processes,” Mr Albanese said.

Greens leader Adam Bandt had earlier said Mr Dutton was demonising people who were merely seeking safety and a better quality of life.

“If politicians are concerned about fleeing bombing in Gaza, they should act and put pressure on the Israeli government to stop the bombing,” he said.

Education Minister Jason Clare had earlier invited Mr Dutton to visit his electorate and meet some of the people from Gaza living in western Sydney.

“These are people who’ve had their homes blown up. Who’ve had their school blown up, who’ve had their hospital blow up, who’ve had their kids blown up,” he said.