Court SimonSIMON COURT (ACT): Thank you Mr Speaker. The ACT Party supports this motion but I would like to point out there are some real problems with the discourse that is being had in New Zealand over the past few months since 7 October. What many have described as an occupation of the land of Israel the Israeli people—Jewish people—call home. The trauma of 7 October has reignited the worst memories of the Holocaust not just in New Zealand's Jewish community but in Jewish people around the world. The majority of Jewish people in New Zealand see those attacks as an existential threat on Jewish people around the world. The sense is that if Israel is not able to survive this attack and these ongoing attacks then it will be harder for the Jewish people to survive. And by extension if a Western liberal democracy like Israel falls to the terrorist attacks of a group like Hamas and its supporters—to the missiles to the kidnapping the hostage taking and all the abominable crimes against civilians—then what hope does a small nation of 5 million like New Zealand—a similar Western democracy—have if we were to accept the fall of the nation of Israel?Anti-Semitism has gone through the roof in New Zealand in the past few months. I've had reports that there are incidents where Jewish children in New Zealand's schools have been bullied for their belief and culture. On the streets here in New Zealand there's been a sense of mob rule at times where even elected members of the New Zealand Parliament have felt free to use Hamas slogans like From the river to the sea" which if you take Hamas seriously and we should do mean the eradication of Israel and its people.But it's not just Israel and her people that have suffered under Hamas. Dozens of citizens from other countries were killed or captured and are being held as hostages right now. Two million people are being held hostage in Gaza right now by Hamas—a murderous dictatorship akin to ISIS. Institutions and representatives we rely on and trust to uphold the rule of law and protect us are failing to stand up for what's right. We should call for peace in the land of Israel and between Israel and her neighbours. We should call for the return of the hostages and we should call those who choose death over life what they are: terrorists because there can never be a lasting peace between Israel and her neighbours until Hamas Hezbollah and their enablers Iran officially formally recognise Israel's right to exist.There are precedents for this. Jordan and Egypt both went to war with Israel with the intention of eliminating the Jewish state many times—1948 1956 1967 1973. In 1988 Jordan became the second Arab state after Egypt to formally sign a peace treaty with Israel recognising that nation's right to exist and establishing security relationships. There are precedents but what it takes is for both sides to recognise each other's right to exist as a precursor for a lasting peace.So while we might debate this here in New Zealand's House of Representatives we must also consider that when we debate the fate of peoples and nations we must also think about those communities in New Zealand—the Jewish community in this case—and how the New Zealand Parliament and our representatives should be supporting them while their family members are held hostage and while their country is under attack."