Published: 27 March 2024
Last updated: 26 March 2024
The record books show that Nova Peris won gold for hockey at the 1996 Olympic Games, when the Hockeyroos defeated South Korea 3-1, followed by gold medals at the 1998 Commonwealth Games in Kuala Lumpur for the 200m sprint and 4 x 100m relay. This made her the only athlete in the world to win Olympic and Commonwealth gold in different sports.
In recent times, however, Peris has focused her considerable profile on a different issue. Here she is on a podcast:
“As an Aboriginal woman, I’m one of four generations that lived under Australia’s greatest lie of Terra Nullius. The Jewish community was instrumental in overturning that lie. I want to reciprocate by helping overturn a similar lie which is being told against the Jewish people - that they have no connection to the Land of Israel and are settler-colonialists.”
Another podcast: “We’ve heard a lot in our national discourse about truth-telling, mostly in the context of my people. How can we allow people to shout `F--- the Jews’ whilst burning flags on the steps of the Sydney Opera House? How can we not call this out and stamp this out? This behaviour is un-Australian.”
And this: “The Jewish community has played a leading role in establishing the rights of indigenous Australians. Lawyers such as Ron Castan, Jeff Sher and others were at the forefront of winning some of the most significant cases. As proud Jews, they understood what it was like for a people to have an internal connection to a land.
“The Jewish people have been the most committed friends and allies of my people. I absolutely refuse to stand by and let anyone deny these truths.”
There’s a generation chanting `From the river to the sea’ without understanding that between the river and the sea is Israel.
Comments2
Wesley Parish28 March at 09:24 am
Several points: First- Terra Nullius is conceptually the same as “A land without a people for a people without a land” – both deny the inhabitants any connection with the land.
Second- I do remember seeing in the Jerusalem Post a rather self-congratulatory article on how Rome was once almost completely converted to Judaism. So conversion has played a large part at certain times in Jewish history. At the same time, in one of her books – precisely which one I’ve forgotten – Karen Armstrong talks about the probability that the Palestinians would’ve been Jewish in 0CE, but the Christian church was very active around the time of the Great Revolt 66-70CE.
Third- I do know something about settler-colonialism, and the Nakba has resemblances to how various other settler-colonial states treated the indigenous people they encountered. Israeli Palestinians resemble New Zealand Maori during the 1940s – part and parcel, but not regarded as fully such. While the Palestinians in the Occupied Palestinian Territories are treated like Cherokee and the Sioux in the North American West during its settlement.
Fourth- the historical situation the Nakba most resembles, to my knowledge, happens to be the Sephardic Expulsion; the expulsion of the Sephardim to create a “Christian” Realm.
Ml27 March at 01:23 pm
Nice
Toda
Perth wa
Jewish