Truth about Gaza visas revealed

The majority of visas from Palestinians fleeing Gaza and seeking entry into Australia since the October 7 attacks have been refused following calls from Opposition Leader Peter Dutton to stop all applications.

NewsWire understands that since Hamas launched a series of attacks on October 7, killing about 1200 civilians, 7111 out of 10,033 applications have been refused.

Of the 2922 Palestinians granted entry into Australia, about 1300 refugees have resettled into Australia largely on short-term visas.

Conversely, 8746 Israeli citizens have been granted visas since the October 7 attacks, with 235 applications rejected.

On Wednesday, Mr Dutton said Australia should refuse all visa applications from Gaza, claiming anyone leaving the war-torn Palestinian territory could threaten Australia’s national security.

“I don’t think people should be coming in through that war zone at all at the moment,” Mr Sutton told Sky News.

“It puts our national security at risk.”

His comments were an escalation on Tuesday’s events after Coalition MPs wrote to Tony Burke, calling on the newly appointed Home Affairs Minister to tighten visa vetting for applicants from Gaza to ensure they held no rhetorical support for Palestinian militant group Hamas.

However, government ministers have maintained the processes are the same since Mr Dutton was home affairs minister, and applicants will be rejected if they are found to have given financial or material support to Hamas.

Despite this, rhetorical support for the listed terrorist organisation did not exclude a person from getting a visa – a process backed by ASIO director-general Mike Burgess.

Education Minister Jason Clare, member for the Western Sydney seat of Blaxland, urged Mr Dutton to visit his community and speak to refugees who have fled Gaza.

“There’s more than a thousand people from Gaza here now,” he said.

“These are people who’ve had their home blown up, who’ve had their school blown up, who’ve had their hospital blown up, in some cases have had their kids blown up, and these are people who are trying to rebuild their lives here in Australia.

“Come and visit them, look them in the eyes and I think that he’ll learn a bit.”

Anthony Albanese also weighed in, telling Sky the Opposition Leader was “always looking to divide” and that he would take pointers from intelligence agencies on national security.