Material published in ‘The Nation’, the newspaper of the Queens­land division of One Nation, by consent of the editor and publisher of the newspaper, has been declared to be unlawful under the Racial Dis­crim­in­a­tion Act, in the Federal Court today.
An article alleged Jews are running a con­spir­acy to steal freedoms from ordinary people, using a com­bin­a­tion of por­no­graphy and internet cen­sor­ship, and was accom­pan­ied by a gross anti-Jewish cartoon.
The complaint was lodged by Jeremy Jones, who at the time of the pub­lic­a­tion was president of the Jewish com­munity’s peak body, the Executive Council of Aus­trali­an Jewry (ECAJ), on behalf of the Council.
Jones argued an article and an accom­pa­ny­ing cartoon published in Volume 4, Edition 10 of the newspaper in late 2004 was a public act which caused offence, insult, humi­li­ation and/or intim­id­a­tion to Jewish Aus­trali­ans, and failed to fall into any of the legal cat­egor­ies which might permit its pub­lic­a­tion.
Rodney Andrew Evans, who took respons­ib­il­ity for the pub­lic­a­tion of the article, agreed to a written statement of apology to Jeremy Jones, which read:
“Mr Rodney Andrew Evans hereby unre­servedly and uncon­di­tion­ally apo­lo­gises to you and the Aus­trali­an Jewish community for having published material in con­tra­ven­tion of the Racial Dis­crim­in­a­tion Act. I undertake that I will not publish any such material in the future and that all such material which is presently published by The Nation in any print or elec­tron­ic media (including the Internet) will forthwith be withdrawn from pub­lic­a­tion”.
Mr Evans also agreed to be restrained from pub­lish­ing similar material in the future.
The article, written by Carl D. Thompson, was described by Federal Minister Peter McGauran MP as one of the most obscene antisemitic articles he had ever seen asso­ci­ated with a political party. Len Harris, who was a senator rep­res­ent­ing One Nation when the material was published, said “There is only one place the One Nation newspaper should be, and that is an incin­er­at­or”.
“All Aus­trali­an gov­ern­ments, national, state and territory, have recog­nised that limited legis­la­tion designed to protect ethnic, national and ethno-religious groups from defam­a­tion, har­ass­ment and intim­id­a­tion strengthens, rather than threatens, democracy”, Mr. Jones said.
“It is a sad reality that a small number of indi­vidu­als within Australia promote prejudice, dis­crim­in­a­tion, fear and har­ass­ment, and the law provides a measure of relief for victims of their actions,” Mr. Jones added.

“The pub­lic­a­tion of grotesque anti-Jewish defam­a­tion in the newspaper of a political party, which at the time had a federal senator and a number of members of state legis­latures, could not be allowed to pass unchal­lenged”, Mr. Jones said.
The ECAJ had pre­vi­ously fought, and won, Racial Hatred com­plaints, against Olga Scully of Tasmania and Frederick Toben of Adelaide, in the Federal Court of Australia. Tran­scripts of those cases can be found on the ECAJ website under the heading “Racial Hatred Cases”.
Further inform­a­tion: Jeremy Jones AM, Immediate Past President E‑mail: ecaj@tig.com.au
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