On Dec. 14, state of Victoria Premier Steve Bracks released a document outlining his government's intent to introduce draconian new laws, under which individuals could be jailed for six months and/or fined $6,000, and organizations fined $30,000, for "vilifying individuals on the basis of race or religion."

The extraordinarily broad law would allow for the prosecution of virtually anything, including name-calling, verbal or written statements, gestures, the wearing of symbols or uniforms, or anything else which a "reasonable observer" could interpret as an offense to a "racial or religious group." It would cover statements or activities even in private homes, and the burden of proof would be on the accused, to prove that he or she was innocent. And, accusations could be made by a "third party," not even the person who was "offended."

The legislation is itself prima facie racist, presuming, as it does, that there are many "races," instead of one human race, all of whose members are created in the image of God. In fact, the law has nothing to do with vilification, but is designed to silence political discussion, as Australia and the world hurtle into the worst financial collapse in centuries. It is a complement to the "shoot-to-kill" laws passed by the federal government late last year, and its proponents are the most fanatical right-wing Zionist extremists in Australia, grouped around Melbourne tax lawyer Mark Leibler, who are associated with the West Bank settlers movement in Israel and the drive for a religious war in the Middle East. For much of the last decade, Leibler has been on a crusade to silence, by whatever means necessary, the Citizens Electoral Council (CEC), the Australian wing of the international political movement associated with Lyndon LaRouche, which has become the only viable policy alternative in the country to the establishment-controlled Labor and Liberal/National parties and their shared policy agenda of free trade, deregulation, and privatization.

Leibler, the head of the Australian Israel Jewish Affairs Council, and the former longtime head of the Zionist Federation of Australia, has been the publicly acknowledged chief driver behind "racial vilification" laws ever since 1992. His hodcarrier for the present effort in Victoria, is the Anti-Defamation Commission of B'nai B'rith (ADC), the Australian wing of the notoriously corrupt U.S. Anti-Defamation League, whose espionage and infiltration activities in the United States caused a scandal several years ago. In its submission on the proposed bill, the ADC claims that the bill is required because it has allegedly discovered "over 14 extremist racist groups based in Victoria," a ludicrous list of mostly postage stamp-sized grouplets and intelligence agency fronts such as the Ku Klux Klan, into which list it has inserted the CEC.

In addition to silencing LaRouche's associates, Leibler and his pals want to shut down any public discussion of their own activities, either of their extremist actions in the Middle East, or of their financial wheeling and dealing. For instance, two members of the Melbourne Football Club recently held a high-profile press conference to call for the bill's passage. Their club is owned by mining magnate and Lubavitcher leader Joseph Gutnick, who finances settlements on the West Bank, and who was reportedly the single-largest financier of former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's notoriously racist election campaign in 1996, on the slogan, "Netanyahu Is Good for the Jews." Leibler's brother Isi, the leader of Australia's Jewish community until he moved to Israel a couple of years ago, openly sided with the fanatical settlers movement against then-Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, shortly before Rabin was assassinated in November 1995. Still another Leibler crony, Rabbi John Levi, recently caused an uproar when he denounced the Uniting Church (Australia's largest) as "anti-Semitic" because it supported the Palestinians; under the new law, Levi could presumably have had the church prosecuted.

The Leibler crowd also wields charges of "anti-Semitism" to shut down any scrutiny of their dubious financial dealings. Federal parliamentary hearings in 1992, for example, questioned Leibler's activities as Australia's foremost tax lawyer, which one leading tax specialist charged had cost the Australian government at least $30 billion in tax evasion. Leibler screamed that the inquiry was "anti-Semitic," though the light shed on himself and his clients, such as Gutnick, forced Leibler's resignation from several tax advisory bodies. Gutnick is currently under suspicion for possible involvement in a long-running scheme to launder hundreds of millions of dollars out of Australia and into Israel, using Australia's notoriously dirty ANZ bank. When faced with similar allegations in 1992, Gutnick's accusers were charged by Leibler with being—what else?—"anti-Semitic."