by Gabriella Vukman
On 26 February, Knox City Council’s Monday minutes were serenaded by a rally outside of the building.
The rally was organised by protest organisation ‘Knox For Palestine’ with the aim of obtaining an official comment from the local council seeking support for Palestine and a cease fire on Gaza.
Knox For Palestine action group founder Jye Batham said ”it was planned as a peaceful gathering of community support for Palestine.”
“Gaza is facing a humanitarian crisis due to the invasion of Israel as a result of the October 7 attack,” Mr Batham said.
“Up until now from the 7th of October more than 30,000 civilians have been murdered in Gaza.”
Running from roughly from 6pm until 7pm before the council meeting, the rally consisted of between 70 and 80 residents from the ranges and beyond.
“It was a broad demographic so we had parents with children in prams, older folk and everyone was there in support for Palestine and was very respectful,” Mr Batham said.
“We have people in our community who have direct connections to people that are suffering in Gaza and other occupied territories of Palestine.
“We all have an interest in making sure human rights are upheld universally.”
Four speakers presented at the rally and councillors watched on before their meeting.
“We’ve been engaging with councillors in the last few weeks leading up to the rally, trying to find somebody who would be onboard with what we are doing because in order to have a motion passed you need a councillor that will endorse it and bring it to council,” Mr Batham said.
“The majority of the councillors seem to think that it is beyond their remit. The common response we’ve been getting is that it is a federal government issue.”
Mr Batham is from the Knox area himself and started the ‘Knox for Palestine’ action group after attending a number of city rallies and recognising the absence of action in his local community.
“I have been attending the rallies and nothing local groups pop up here and there but we didn’t have anything for our area so I thought if I can’t do it who will,” he said.
“Our volunteer list grew pretty quickly and there is a lot of concern in the Knox area for what is going on and lots of people who want to see a cease fire.”
The Knox for Palestine action group has been running since the start of February.
“We’re not asking local government to make international policy, we’re asking them to make an official statement to acknowledge what is going on and the impact it is having on our community and normalise talking about it as a genocide,” he said.
“More about getting them to pass a statement rather than creating policy around international diplomacy.”
