Reports of missile strikes on Iran by Israel; Anthony Albanese denounces a billboard attack on the Victorian Premier; The Big Freeze goes ahead before the traditional Collingwood Melbourne King's Birthday clash.
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TRANSCRIPT:
- Reports of missile strikes on Iran by Israel;
- Anthony Albanese denounces a billboard attack on the Victorian Premier;
- The Big Freeze goes ahead before the traditional Collingwood Melbourne King's Birthday clash.
Israel has carried out attacks on targets inside Iran using air-launched ballistic missiles.
Iran's state television has reported explosions in three cities: Tehran, Tabriz, and Isfahan.
The strikes are in response to several attacks on northern Israel, which are in themselves a retaliation for Israeli's bombing of Dahiyeh, said to be a Hezbollah stronghold in Beirut's southern suburbs, in which two people were killed and at least 20 others injured.
Iranian military spokesman Ebrahim Zolfaghari says Tehran has warned Israel against expanding its operations in Lebanon.
“We had previously warned that if the crime in the suburbs of Beirut expands, we will attack targets in the occupied territories. The Zionist army must stop its attacks on southern Lebanon and the suburbs, and if it expands its attacks on that region or responds to Iran's actions, it will face more crushing and regrettable blows, and destructive attacks will begin against the regime and its supporters. May Allah, the Most Wise, be victorious.”
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At least three people are feared to have been killed in an earthquake in the Philippines.
Disaster management chief in the southern city of General Santos, Agripino Dacera, says the fatalities are still being verified as authorities assess the extent of the damage on the ground from the magnitude 7.8 earthquake.
Videos posted to Facebook show a shopping centre with a fast food restaurant collapsing into rubble in the city, while a building on a local school campus crumpled in another.
The United States Geological Survey has reported the offshore quake hit at a depth of 35 kilometres, about 24 kilometres west of
Mindanao's Sarangani province.
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Local police are working with their Greek counterparts following reports one of Australia's most wanted men has been arrested after three decades on the run.
New South Wales Premier Chris Minns says Australian authorities are expected to apply for the extradition of 55 year old James Dalamangas, who is wanted over the fatal stabbing of George Giannopolous at a suburban Sydney night club in 1999.
"I know that NSW Police and the AFP will be working to extradite that person to our country as soon as possible, and I think most people in NSW would expect them to face the full force of the law."
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Pauline Hanson has mocked the Victorian Premier for her reaction to a mobile billboard campaign in Melbourne that features Jacinta Allan wearing a witch's hat alongside the slogan "Ditch the Witch", the same phrase used against former prime minister Julia Gillard during her time in office.
Jacinta Allan herself has called the campaign part of a growing normalisation of misogyny disguised as criticism - but the One Nation leader has told Sky News the premier is over-reacting.
"Suck it up, sweetheart. If you've seen what's happened to me over the years, I remember years ago Tim Fischer called me a witch and I should be burned at the stake. So, I've been tagged that long before you. So anyway, it's just, toughen up."
But Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has condemned the political campaign as sexist, unacceptable and damaging to public life.
Mr Albanese says personal attacks on politicians have no place in public debate.
"Young girls will see that, you know, depiction of a premier as a witch, just like the denigration that Julia Gillard suffered from as Prime Minister, and it is just not on. And what I don't want to do is to have a press conference in this courtyard after a tragedy."
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Health authorities are urging seniors to get a free vaccine to protect them from a common winter virus that can cause severe illness, hospitalisation and death.
R-S-V shots have been added to the National Immunisation Register, to make them free of charge for people aged 75 and over, and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people aged 60 and over.
A maternal RSV vaccine was added last year to the Program to help protect newborns in their first months of life.
More than 225,000 mothers have now received the shot, helping drive a more than nine per cent drop in RSV cases in young children.
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To sport,
Collingwood are facing the Melbourne Demons at the MCG for the annual King's Birthday AFL blockbuster.
And as is tradition, organisers have held the 12th Big Freeze event before the game to raise awareness and money for the Fight MND charity.
FightMND has helped raise more than $150 million to fight the incurable and fatal illness that founder Neale Daniher called The Beast.
This fan says it's a special day as the first Big Freeze slide since Daniher passed away last month.
"It's very emotional. And this is my first ever one. It's always been on my bucket list. And we actually live out in the country close to where Neale was born. So it's even more special."
