The campaign to “globalize the Intifada” has already provided plenty of disturbing examples of just how toxic anti-Israel rhetoric can become.
Now Australia has been confronted with another chilling case of apparent political violence.
Independent Australian MP Helen Haines was critically injured after being deliberately struck by a vehicle outside her electorate office in Wangaratta, Victoria.
The man arrested over the alleged attack has been identified by local media as 43-year-old Brendan Nugent.
And his social media history makes for disturbing reading.
For years, Nugent’s online activism focused largely on environmental issues. But following October 7, 2023 and the subsequent war in Gaza, his attention increasingly shifted toward Israel and the Palestinians.
His posts included attacks on Australian politicians over their positions on Israel, accusations that Israel was being given “impunity,” fundraising appeals for Gaza, and the sharing of material sympathetic to Hamas and the Houthis.
* Followed by David Shoebridge of The Greens. * Incessant anti-Israel posts. * Followed and reposted Candace Owens and other ‘woke right’ figures. He meandered between WOKE LEFT and WOKE RIGHT …with the driving commonality of JEW HATRED. NEITHER of which can be pinned on Pauline or conservatives.
— Mark Rowley (@MarkWRowley) October 20, 2026
To be clear, police have not established that Nugent’s anti-Israel views motivated the alleged attack on Haines.
But that doesn’t make his online trajectory irrelevant. Since October 7, we have watched anti-Israel activism increasingly normalize rhetoric portraying Israel and its supporters not merely as wrong, but as monstrous, genocidal, and deserving of resistance “by any means necessary.”
Nugent’s social media history offers a disturbing glimpse into that environment: an account once dominated by environmental activism increasingly consumed by rage over Israel and Gaza.
Whether that played any role whatsoever in Monday’s horrific attack is now a matter for investigators. But there is a broader question worth asking.
For three years, chants to “globalize the Intifada,” celebrations of “resistance,” defenses of Hamas, and increasingly extreme rhetoric surrounding Israel have been dismissed by many as merely political expression.
At what point do we start taking seriously the possibility that relentlessly legitimizing hatred and political violence can have consequences beyond protest marches and social media feeds?
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© Divuach Ne’eman R”A, 2025
