Grace Tame has drawn outrage from overseas with Israel’s Deputy Foreign Minister demanding she be stripped of her Australian of the Year honour.
Sharren Haskel hit out after Tame claimed on Monday that reports of sexual violence carried out against Israeli women by Hamas terrorists during the October 7, 2023 attack ‘have been debunked’.
‘Grace Tame claims the mantle of activism, but her compassion is “selective”,’ Haskel wrote on X.
She accused Tame of choosing which victims she supports while ignoring others, pointing to crises across the Middle East.
‘She did not stand with the women of Iran as they were beaten, tortured, raped and then murdered by the regime,’ Haskel wrote.
She accused Tame of failing to speak up for persecuted Christian communities in Iran, Lebanon and Syria.
‘She has not stood with Israeli women who were raped and sexually tortured as a weapon of war,’ Haskel wrote.
‘In fact she’s denied the horrors of October 7, because the victims were Jews.
Grace Tame has drawn outrage from overseas with Israel’s Deputy Foreign Minister demanding she be stripped of her Australian of the Year honour
‘That is not principled activism. It is selective outrage driven by politics.’
International bodies including the UN and ICC have repeatedly confirmed that sexual violence occurred during the Hamas attacks.
Haskel said Tame’s denial should cost her the 2021 Australian of the Year title.
‘If an award is meant to represent moral courage and universal human rights, then those who apply those principles selectively should not hold it,’ she said.
‘Grace Tame should lose her Australian of the Year award.’
Tame was asked by ABC Sydney Mornings host Hamish Macdonald whether she had publicly condemned the extreme sexual violence committed against Israeli women on October 7, 2023.
‘Can you please ask Grace why she is selective in her outrage? I have never heard her condemn or speak out on behalf of the Israeli women who were raped and killed by Hamas on October 7,’ Macdonald asked, on behalf of a listener.
Tame immediately rejected the premise.
Israel’s Deputy Foreign Minister Sharren Haskel hit out after Tame claimed reports of sexual violence carried out against Israeli women by Hamas terrorists during the October 7, 2023 attack ‘have been debunked’
‘I’m not going to sink to the level of… entertaining any kind of propaganda, Hamish. Let’s not do that.’
Macdonald hit back: ‘What’s the propaganda included in that question?’
‘Those things have been debunked,’ Tame replied.
Tame said ‘awful things are being perpetrated by both sides’ and that she was ‘outraged by all of the violence’.
‘Clearly I don’t support any of it,’ she said.
‘I am a human rights activist who advocates for the safety of all human beings, no matter their background, whether they are Jewish, whether they are Muslims, whether they are Christian, whether they are atheist.’
Tame reflected on her own experiences.
‘As someone who was raped multiple times as a child, I have seen the horrendous things human beings are capable of,’ she said.
Tame was asked by ABC Sydney Mornings host Hamish Macdonald whether she had publicly condemned the extreme sexual violence committed against Israeli women on October 7, 2023 (pictured, a memorial set up at the former site of the Nova music festival)
Tame insisted she did not dismiss any allegations of violence, but urged Australians to understand the broader conflict.
‘As someone who has been raped multiple times as a child myself… I do not dismiss any of it, no matter who the perpetrator is, and no matter who the victim is,’ she said.
She also argued that Australians should consider how Palestinians hear common political rhetoric.
‘I would say to those people, what do you think a Palestinian feels or an Arab person feels when they hear phrases like ‘Israel has a right to defend itself’? What are they defending themselves against? And what does that defence look like?’ she said.
‘From where I’m sitting, and from where a lot of people are sitting, that defence looks like blowing up schoolchildren, blowing up hospitals, aid sites, and indiscriminately targeting civilians. So do you not think that that’s offensive as well?’
Daily Mail contacted Foreign Minister Penny Wong for comment.
