Ms Julie Bishop (Curtin, Liberal Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Hansard source

I take the honourable parliamentary secretary to the statement by the Minister for Foreign Affairs to the House on Monday, a couple of weeks back, in relation to the expulsion of the Israeli diplomat. I am sure the parliamentary secretary is aware of that statement. In that statement, the foreign minister named David Irvine as having visited Mossad, in Israel, in April. That would appear to go against the protocol that the parliamentary secretary just referred to. I also refer, in that statement, to the foreign minister’s statement that an Israeli diplomat was expelled in 2005 and to the indication that the reasons for the expulsion were linked to a previous occasion when Israel was alleged to have forged passports. Will the parliamentary secretary indicate why the foreign minister named David Irvine and stated that his visit was to Mossad in Israel, and will he provide the Committee with the specific reasons for the expulsion of the Israeli diplomat in 2005, as identified by the foreign minister? Will he also provide specific details of the agreement that the foreign minister said exists between Israel and Australia over the use of passports? And I ask the parliamentary secretary: has there been any impact on the sharing of intelligence from the Israeli intelligence forces with Australia in recent weeks?

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