TRANSCRIPT
In this bulletin;
- A Labor senator breaks ranks to accuse Israel of genocide;
- Slovakia's Prime Minister Robert Fico in a life threatening condition after being shot;
- And in sport, two NRL fans get lifetime bans for alleged racial abuse towards Indigenous players.
Labor senator Fatima Payman is accusing Israel of conducting a genocide in Gaza, calling for the Prime Minister to sanction the Israeli government.
In a thinly-veiled criticism of Anthony Albanese, Senator Payman criticised Australian leaders for what she called performative gestures.
She is the first Labor parliamentarian to break ranks by describing what is happening in Gaza as a genocide.
Ms Payman says she had no option other than to voice her concerns.
"My conscience has been uneasy for far too long. And I must call this out for what it is. This is a genocide and we need to stop pretending otherwise. I see our leaders performatively gesture, defending the oppressor’s right to oppress, while gaslighting the global community about the rights of self-defence."
Israel rejects claims of genocide, arguing at an ongoing case at the International Court of Justice that it's acting in self-defence in fighting Hamas.
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A second major university has moved to shut down a pro-Palestinian encampment as another threatens police action against protesters staging a sit-in on campus.
The Australian National University in Canberra told students to prepare to vacate the camp after it met organisers.
The ACT's National Tertiary Education Union says students have been directed to collect their belongings and vacate the encampment by the end of the week.
Deakin University in Melbourne ordered the immediate dismantling and removal of a similar encampment at its Burwood campus on Monday.
Pro-Palestinian students at universities across Australia have created more than a dozen encampments in total and say they have no plans to move.
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Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico is in a life-threatening condition after he was shot in what has been described as a politically motivated assassination attempt.
The gunman shot the 59-year-old five times as he was leaving a government meeting on Wednesday leaving the prime minister in a critical condition and still undergoing surgery hours later on Wednesday evening.
Interior Minister Matus Sutaj Estok told a news briefing the assassination attempt was "politically motivated and the perpetrator's decision was born closely after the presidential election".
The shooting in the central Slovak town of Handlova, which local media say was carried out by a 71-year-old man, stunned the small central European nation and has drawn international condemnation.
Slovakia is a member of NATO and the European Union and has little history of political violence.
Russian President Vladimir Putin and United States President Joe Biden have both expressed their shock and condemnation at the shooting.
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Migrant communities are calling for greater transparency regarding the latest updates to the National Disability Insurance Scheme.
The federal government has flagged substantial changes to the scheme, following massive costs that are projected to reach $90 billion at the end of the decade.
Finance Minister Katy Gallagher says one of the budget's greatest pressures was on how to get the NDIS back on track.
But Naha Prakash, from the National Ethnic Disability Alliance, has told SBS these changes could be coming at the expense of the migrant communities.
"We want to make sure that our communities don't miss out. We do require a lot more transparency around the rollout and understand what that means for our communities because they're currently very worried so there's a need for it to be clear. We do believe that no person with a disability should miss out on essential support. Currently in the existing budget we think there's not a lot of information regarding foundational support. And we would've liked to see something more on this."
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In sport,
Two NRL fans have received lifetime bans after allegedly racially abusing Indigenous players Latrell Mitchell and Cody Walker during a Round 10 game.
On Sunday, the NRL received a report from another fan, who claimed the two South Sydney players had been targeted by members of the crowd during the team's loss to St George Illawarra the previous night.
It then prompted an investigation by the integrity unit, resulting in the two spectators being issued with a breach notice under the league's spectator code of conduct.
