Good afternoon,

Thank you for being here today, and thank you for having me.

My name is Julian Leeser. I am the Federal Member of Parliament for Berowra.

I don’t represent a Kurdish community but my friendship with the Kurdish community goes back to the days before I was a parliamentarian when I visited their community centre and heard of the plight of the Kurds worldwide.

The Kurdish people like Australians are a multifaith people- there are Kurdish Christians Muslims and Jews.

The Kurdish people know all too well what is meant by the phrase ‘in the firing line’.

Kurdish History

For decades, they have lived across the borders of a very tense and dangerous part of the world with no homeland of their own. They’ve been caught in the crossfire of other people’s conflicts, but they’ve also been an easy target of hostility themselves.

Despite being the fourth-largest ethnic group in the Middle East, numbering about 35 million, the Kurds have no nation-state and have straddled the borders of Iraq, Turkey, Syria, Iran and Armenia for many years.

After World War I, the Treaty of Sevres made provision for a Kurdish state, but, when the boundaries of Turkey were created in 1923 at the Treaty of Lausanne, no Kurdish state was created.

The Kurds have instead been a minority group spread across multiple countries.

The interests of Kurds have frequently been sacrificed for the desires of governments that don’t have them as a priority.

Throughout the 1980s, Saddam Hussein’s regime in Iraq systemically targeted the Kurdish people. The Anfal campaign included bombings, firing squads, the raping of women, and chemical warfare against the Kurds. We don’t know exactly how many people were killed during the years of Anfal, but the numbers are estimated to have been as high as 182,000, including women and children. Thousands of schools, hospitals and mosques were destroyed, and about 90 per cent of Kurdish villages in the region were wiped out.

From the earliest days of the war against the radical Islamist group ISIS, Kurds have been caught in the midst of violence. In 2013, ISIS attacked Kurdish areas of northern Syria. It wasn’t long before Kurdish fighters were at the forefront of the international coalition’s fight against ISIS.

The Kurds have done more than their fair share of fighting and dying for a cause we also believe in. In the fight against ISIS, Kurdish fighters, under the name of the Syrian Democratic Forces, have been steadfast allies. They have been central to the fight, and Australia will never forget their courage and sacrifice.

As the ISIS inspired Bondi terror attacks remind us Australia remains in the firing line of this radical Islamist terror group too.

Rojava

Today we gather because of the Kurdish people in Rojava.

I stand with you in solidarity with the Kurdish people of Rojava. I stand with you because what is happening in northern and eastern Syria is not an abstract geopolitical dispute.

It is about families, communities, culture, language, and the most basic right of all — the right to live free from terror and persecution.

The Kurdish people know better than most what it means to stand against extremism at a terrible cost. When the world was threatened by ISIS, it was Kurdish fighters, Kurdish women, and Kurdish communities who stood on the front line. They paid for that stand in blood, in lives, and in sacrifice. More than eleven thousand never came home. The world is safer because of what they did.

And yet today, those same communities are under siege once again.

We have seen reports of Syrian forces targeting Alawites, Druze and Kurds – there are reports of massacres, forced displacement and collective punishment particularly in Kobane and the Hasakah /Jazira region and the release of ISIS operatives all of which is deeply alarming.

Rojava represents something profoundly important. In a region too often torn apart by hatred and sectarianism, people of different backgrounds have lived side by side: Kurds, Arabs, Assyrians, Yazidis, Christians and Muslims.

Women are not pushed aside, but visible and active in their communities.

Ordinary people choosing cooperation over chaos, responsibility over revenge. That is why these communities are targeted — not because they threaten peace, but because they demonstrate that another way of living together in the Middle East is possible.

What we are seeing now — the targeting of civilians, the displacement of families, the cutting of water and electricity, and the assault on Kobane — is not accidental. It is deliberate. It is collective punishment. And it must be called out clearly and honestly.

Australia is a country built by people who know what it means to flee persecution and rebuild with hope.

The Kurdish community here understands that experience deeply. You contribute to this country not only economically, but morally — by reminding us that freedom is never guaranteed, and that human dignity must be defended, even when it is inconvenient.

The Kurdish people are defined by endurance. Over generations, through repeated upheaval and displacement, they have held fast to their language, their culture, their music, and the centrality of family and community life. These are not small things. They are the foundations of identity. Preserving them under sustained pressure requires discipline, resilience, and quiet courage.

What stands out is not just survival, but continuity. Kurdish parents have taught their children who they are, where they come from, and why that matters. Songs, stories, and traditions have been passed on not because it was easy, but because it was necessary. That determination to remember — and to ensure the next generation remembers — is one of the most powerful forms of resistance there is.

The Kurdish people have also shown a deep sense of solidarity with others. Time and again, in moments of conflict and fear, Kurdish communities have chosen compassion over division. They have sheltered neighbours of different faiths and backgrounds, not because it was politically convenient, but because it was morally right. Their instinct has been to protect life, not to dominate others.

That instinct speaks to values that are deeply embedded. It reflects a belief that dignity is not conditional, and that humanity does not end at the edge of identity or belief.

Let me be clear: standing with the Kurdish people does not require rewriting borders or choosing sides in every conflict.

It requires something far simpler — the willingness to speak plainly when civilians are targeted, and the refusal to look away when a people are punished for who they are.

So I am here today to:

• condemn the targeting of civilians and the ongoing siege of Kurdish-populated areas;
• Demand an immediate, independent international investigation into war crimes and human rights violations committed by Syrian forces;
• Press for urgent humanitarian access and civilian protection measures in North and East Syria;
• Oppose any political legitimisation of extremist actors responsible for mass violence;
• Reaffirm support for pluralism, civilian protection, and democratic principles in Syria

Your presence here today sends a message to the political leaders of this city, this state and our nation and to the international community, and to those under fire in Rojava: you are not forgotten, you are not alone, and your struggle is seen. We stand with you.

Thank you.