ANZAC memory isn’t a PR tool

A few days ahead of ANZAC Day, a pro-Israel lobby group posts an image of Australian graves at Beersheba1 with the line:

“Freedom secured through sacrifice.”

On the surface, it looks respectful. Historical. Even moving. But the context tells a very different story.

First off - the obvious.

The utter tone deafness to the appalling desecration of Australian graves in Gaza uncovered just a few months earlier by satellite imagery then admitted by the IDF2.

And like Herzog during his visit to Australia after this was discovered - silence.

Because Beersheba serves a purpose, Gaza does not.

The Australian lobby likes to make a connection between the Australian Light Horse charge at Beersheba and the creation of Israel.

“Freedom secured through sacrifice” — placed over Beersheba graves — subtly associates this with Israel’s own national commemoration day Yom Hazikaron that by coincidence only happens to be close to ANZAC Day.

As they have used the image of the Beersheba graves here they have previously used images of the 100th anniversary re-enactment in Israel in 2017 where one of the riders controversially held an Israeli flag much to then Prime Minister Netanyahu’s delight3.

So why use that image now?

Because it suggests a narrative “that Australia and Israel share a deep historical bond, forged in battle”.

Beersheba took place in 1917 — 31 years before Israel existed.

Australian soldiers weren’t fighting “for Israel”. They were fighting in a completely different war, under a completely different reality.

There is no link.

The article by AIJACs Arsen Ostrovsky4 goes on to make comment on Israel’s ongoing wars in the region which Australia and the rest of the world has stepped back from in its latest aggression with Iran and Lebanon.

He says:

“The bond between Australia and Israel is not merely diplomatic or strategic”

There is no “bond” and the Australian Government refused to send delegates to AIJAC’s most recent annual IDF/Palantir/Elbit/Australian politician summit on 27th November 20255.

“It is rooted in shared values: democracy, resilience and the belief that freedom must be fought for at all costs”

I call crap.

Israeli “democracy” is anything but, their “resilience” is brutally enforced and “at all costs” for Israel is precisely the problem.

Australia is not without fault. Its history carries its own record of injustice. But it does not bulldoze allied war graves — and frame it as necessity or commit countless other atrocities “at all costs”.

There is a difference between honouring the dead… and using them.

This crosses that line.