PRESENTATION OF A GOLD COIN COMMEMORATING THE DEDICATION OF THE ANZAC MEMORIAL AND FOREST IN ISRAEL
MELBOURNE, VIC. 29 OCTOBER 1968
Speech by the Prime Minister, Mr. John Gorton.
Mr. President, Your Excellency:
I understand that at some later stage in these proceedings there will be a presentation of a memento, and I wish now to take this opportunity of saying how much I value the opportunity to appear before you and how honoured I am that the Government of Israel has made this occasion possible. I would like, Mr. ' President, through you,. and also Your S Excellency, through you, to express to the Government of Israel my own deep gtatitude and appreciation.
W The Anzac Memorial Forest must, in a sense, be unique.
There it is, part of a programme of transforming unproductive land to
productive land, and yet at the same time a memorial to the 17, 000
Australians who were in Palestine as it then was in the First World
War and to the 70, 000 who were there in the Second World War.
Australians who on both occasions rode, if they were Light Horsemen,
knee to knee with citizens of Australia of Jewish extraction and were
helped by those of Jewish extraction in that country a memorial to
shared efforts, to shared dangers, to shared hardships so long ago.
I have not seen this forest, but I can in my mind imagine
it a vast stretch of eucalypts, bearing witness to those things which
were together done, and reminding us of battles long ago. This must
serve to draw closer and closer the ties between our two countries which
are I think already as close as the ties between any two countries I know.
There is in some ways a remarkable parallel between the
State of Israel and the nation of Australia. Both have got to develop and
have developed in a harsh environment where nature is not kind, where
there is no smiling way of developing, of growing, of building, but where
what has to be attained has to be attained only by great effort and by
wresting from ; that harsh environment the requirements for growth.
Both of us are, in the councils of the world, comparatively
new, comparatively small, and yet I think both of us are, by applying
scientific knowledge, by applying technology, showing what can be done
in arid country, showing what can be done if effort is put in. And both
of us require, and Israel particularly has required over the years,
assistance from outside in the form of capital to enable the building of
industrial muscles, the provision of a better life for its citizens to go ahead.
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ICertainly the area of your land is smaller than the area
of ours. Probably, I think, the amount of good land that we have is
perhaps greater than the amount in Israel, but having said that, still
there are these shared problems, still there are these requirements
for overcoming them, and that is something else we have in common.
That is not all. Though we in Australia and though you
Australians have not ever had to bear the direct impact of total itar ianfs m,
yet those of your faith have seen what can happen when people are prepared
to give away their freedom, when people are prepared to allow an allpowerful
dictator to decide their fates and their lives. You know it,
perhaps at first hand, perhaps from stories from relatives, or friends,
certainly you know it, and while we have not had to experience it, yet
we know it too. There is, I think, again a shared determination by the
State of Israel and by the nation of Australia to see that there will never
develop in our countries that kind of totalitarianism, and to seek to do as
much as within our compass lies to see that it does not develop any further,
that it does not spread any further. We have seen what happens to
individuals when one accepts the doctrine which you and we do not accept
that the citizen exists to serve the state and not the state to serve the
0 citizen. We have seen what can happen when religious bigotry or
political bigotry, or racial bigotry is allowed to run riot, and that can
only run riot if totalitarianism is in existence. That again is something
I believe we have in common.
Of course you have difficulties in Israel, Sir, that we don't
have. We do not have to plough our land with a rifle within arm's reach,
we do not have to go to bed at night and bar and lock the doors or be careful
that the lights don't so shine that a sniper may take advantage of it. We can
use ploughshares alone. In Israel it must be ploughshares and arms. But
we have as a nation, I believe, a feeling and a knowledge of what this might
be like. We have an admiration for what has been achieved on the
developmental and the economic and the defensive front in Israel. We
have this shared determination of which I have previcu sly spoken.
Now, Sir, may I add this. I believe that we in Australia
have reason to be grateful to the Jewish community of Australians because
they have helped in my view to foster the knowledge of Israel in Australia
and draw closer the bonds between Israel and Australia, leading to that
kind of genuinely friendly feeling which I believe exists between our two
countries. The rebirth of Israel after 2, 000 years though it was not-easy
has been, because of heffsofte Jesh _ 6mmrnity in this and other
countries, something in which we can take some joy as well as those of
Jewfish extraction. so / 3
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We look forward as a government and as a people to the
time when true peace will be restored in that area in which Israel lies.
I haven't heard many people saying " Let us sit down and talk. Let us
sit down and discuss" though I know, Sir, your own government wants
this to happen. When it does and when the foundations of true peace are
laid and when no longer is there a need for a rifle or a grenade to be
within the reach of somebody ploughing a field in Israel, then how much
better it will be for the human race as a whole, how much brighter and
easier the'future will be for a country like Israel so close in affinity, in
its difficulties, in its desires, in its aims to Australia.
For these reasons, Sir, for the admiration we have, for
the problems that we share in common, for the aspirations and ideals
which I think are the same between Australians and Israelis, I am doubly
honoured that today you have asked me to come here and talk to you. To
you, Sir, the representative of the Government of Israel, and to all of
you, who are not Israelis, but Australians of the Jewish faith, I thank you
for the opportunity and express my gratitude to you.
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