How Qatar Bought a Slice of Australia – And What It’s Costing Us

Australians now enjoy cheaper flights to Europe, thanks to Qatar Airways’ $1 billion deal for a 25% stake in Virgin Australia, recently approved by Treasurer Jim Chalmers.

Greenlighting 28 weekly flights from Australia to Doha reverses Labor’s 2023 block on national interest grounds. Transport Minister Catherine King had cited Qatar’s 2020 invasive internal searches of Australian women, yet now Qatar’s state-owned airline sidesteps that, buying Virgin’s air rights, but using its own planes and crew.

Qatar isn’t a stranger to using wealth to buy its way in through the back door with their alleged bribery crushing Australia’s 2010 FIFA World Cup hosting bid.

Some speculate that Qatar plans to purchase all of Virgin. In a volatile security environment, are Australians comfortable with foreign control of one of the country’s two major airlines?

Despite an election campaign, no Australian politician will touch the topic of Qatari influence.

Qatar practices modern slavery. Up to 6500 worker deaths were linked to the World Cup. Human rights groups have been silent about the deal. Imagine the outcry and boycott campaigns from the Greens if Virgin had partnered with Israel’s EL AL.

After Iran, Qatar is the largest state sponsor of radical Islamist groups.

On October 7, 2023, Hamas leaders Ismail Haniyeh and Khaled Meshaal, celebrated from Doha’s luxury hotels as their terrorists slaughtered 1,200 Israelis.

Qatar’s billions have propped up Hamas since 2012, funding its tunnel network. Its Defence Minister once tweeted, “we are all Hamas.”

Beyond Hamas, Qatar has housed a rogues’ gallery of terror groups, including the Taliban, Al-Qaeda financiers and 9/11 planner Khaled Sheikh Mohammed who worked for its government in the 1990s.

Qatar backs the Muslim Brotherhood sparking unrest across the Arab world, so much so that in 2017, several of its neighbours blockaded Qatar for three years.

After September 11, Saudi Arabia reformed, and recently the UAE signed the Abraham Accords. Qatar took up the mantle of extremism among Sunni states.

Would we tolerate an airline partnership with Afghanistan’s Taliban Government or the Islamic Republic of Iran? Qatar isn’t far off.

Alongside aviation, Qatar is buying Australian farmland, energy assets and property but its most visible presence is Al Jazeera.

State-owned Al Jazeera, funded with $750 million annually, beams into Australian homes via ABC and SBS, which elevated it from a niche satellite channel here. It hasn’t criticised Qatar in 30 years, instead serving as Hamas PR, airing degrading hostage ceremonies and securing exclusive interviews with Yahya Sinwar and other terrorist leaders. Israeli intelligence alleges its journalists doubled as Hamas operatives during the October 7 massacre.

Banned in a dozen countries for incitement, including Egypt, Jordan and Saudi Arabia, it is the only major media outlet banned in Israel where a special law labelled it a ‘Hamas mouthpiece’. Even the Palestinian Authority bans it.

In the US, Al Jazeera was required to register as a foreign agent. It is sidelined with a tiny audience because major networks avoid the station once known for broadcasting Osama bin Laden’s speeches.

ABC and SBS provide Al Jazeera unparalleled legitimacy.

Australia sanctions Russian and Iranian media yet the major role that Qatar’s state-owned, extremist media is granted by Australia’s taxpayer-funded broadcasters is a stark example of foreign influence.

Qatar also focuses its influence on education. It is the largest foreign donor to American universities with estimates of $10 billion since 2000.

It’s unsurprising that campuses experiencing the greatest explosions in antisemitism include Qatar’s major beneficiaries. Qatari money reportedly flows to American K-12 schools.

Unlike the US, Australia doesn’t disclose individual foreign donors, but Austrade boasts over 20 Australian universities collaborate with Qatari institutions.

Chinese Confucius Institutes on Australian campuses faced scrutiny. Qatar’s involvement, including in Islamic and Arabic studies centres demands similar attention.

Qatar pursues a dual agenda, funding Islamist extremism globally while sanitising its image by buying up Western cultural icons like French football team, Paris Saint-Germain (PSG), UK Department store, Harrods and Italian fashion house, Valentino. Qatar’s purchase of Harvey Weinstein’s Miramax film production company granted it rights to 700 movies. This strategy climaxed in the 2022 FIFA World Cup where the world overlooked Qatar’s abysmal human rights record, discrimination against women and gays and credible bribery allegations.

Journalists, thinktanks and influencers both right and left are on Qatar’s payroll. Tucker Carlson and Jeremy Corbyn fawn over Qatar. Qatari charm offensives have seen a US Senator and EU parliamentarians charged with accepting bribes. Aides in Israel’s Prime Minister’s office of all places were charged with taking Qatari funds. Is something similarly sinister occurring in Australian politics?

With just 350,000 citizens, fewer than Newcastle, Qatar’s influence here is outsized. Nobody begrudges Australians cheaper holidays on Greek beaches or Swiss ski-slopes, but Australian politicians must be clear-eyed. Qatari money and influence mustn’t serve as a Trojan horse, importing extremist values, damaging social cohesion and risking national security.