Fatima Payman has voted against her own party to support the Greens motion calling on the government to recognise the state of Palestine – opening her up to potential expulsion from the ALP.
The extraordinary decision comes after the 28-year-old first-term Labor senator diverged from the party line last month to describe the ongoing crisis in Gaza as a ‘genocide’ and demand more from her colleagues and Prime Minister Anthony Albanese.
Firebrand senator Lidia Thorpe seized upon the high-stakes moment, which attracted a crowd of journalists, to lash out at politicians from both major parties for voting against the Greens motion.
She said doing so made them ‘complicit in genocide’.
Ms Payman chose to abstain from a series of initial votes on Tuesday afternoon, defiantly sitting in the back – behind the action but in full sight of journalists – while the debate raged on.
But when push came to shove and the final vote on the motion moved by Greens senator Nick McKim for ‘the Senate to recognise the State of Palestine’, Ms Payman was approached by cross bencher David Pocock.
After a brief discussion, the pair walked toward the Greens together.
There was a brief moment where it was unclear whether Ms Payman was leaving the chamber entirely or had decided to vote, but then she took a seat beside Pocock and directly in front of Ms Thorpe.
Ms Payman faces expulsion from the party for choosing to cross the floor.
Minutes earlier, it looked as though she had come to the chamber to be a silent bystander, sitting at the back behind Ms Thorpe as the outspoken Senator shouted ‘from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free’.
‘Complicit in genocide, all of you,’ she shouted, pointing at the gathered Labor and Coalition senators opposing the Greens motion.
‘Shame on you all. Have a good night sleep.’
When Senate President Sue Lines attempted to intervene to call for order, Ms Thorpe carried on: ‘You’re complicit too, President.’
Greens leader in the Senate David Shoebridge also interjected, arguing the major parties had teamed up to ‘gag’ debate on the matter.
‘They gagged it,’ he said. ‘Disrespectful is ignoring a genocide. They have gagged debate.’
Throughout all the chaos, Ms Payman hardly lifted her head.
She had the option to not come to the Senate at all during the vote, making her decision to appear and yet visibly abstain all the more noticeable.
She held a brief media conference after the vote opening up about her decision, telling the gathered crowd she ‘still has the core values of the Labor party’ and hopes to continue serving as a Labor senator.
‘What you just witnessed was the first Labor member to cross the floor in almost 30 years. My decision to cross the floor was the most difficult decision I have had to make.
‘Each step I took across the Senate floor felt like a mile. I know I did not walk these steps by myself, and I know I did not walk them alone.
‘I’ve walked with the West ns who have stopped me in the streets and told me not to give up. I’ve walked with the rank and file Labor Party members who told me we must do more.’
Ms Payman said she was ‘bitterly disappointed’ that more of her colleagues did not join her in supporting the motion, noting Labor’s official policy platform ‘recognises both Israel and Palestine’.
‘We cannot believe in two state solutions and only recognise one.
‘I was not elected as a token representative of diversity, I was elected to serve the people of Western and uphold the values instilled in me by my late father. Today I have made a decision that would make him proud and make everyone proud to err on the side of humanity.’
Greens leader Adam Bandt issued a damning statement after the vote slamming Labor senators who refused to cross the floor despite saying they ‘care about the plight of Palestinians’.
‘What Senator Payman’s action shows is that every Labor MP who said they care about the plight of Palestinians are utterly cowardly and full of nothing but hollow words,’ he said.
‘Senator Payman’s courageous actions now show up every Labor MP who has refused to cross the floor and to vote to do the right thing.’
Ms Payman, whose family fled Afghanistan when she was eight, last month asked the Prime Minister what the ‘magic number… of international rights laws Israel must break for us to say enough’.
‘They are gaslighting the global community about the rights of self-defence,’ she said, and described the ongoing conflict in Gaza as a ‘genocide’.
‘From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.’
The Coalition and Labor united to condemn that phrase, agreeing on a motion urging senators to ‘refrain from inflammatory and divisive comments, both inside and outside the chamber at all times’.
Ms Payman joined the Labor Party because she felt aligned with the traditional working class values, having watched her parents be taken advantage of as they raised her in .
‘I witnessed the struggles my parents went through to put food on the table, to pay for our education and to provide a roof over our heads,’ she previously told the Senate.
‘From discrimination and abuse to job insecurity and low wages, my father endured those hardships without complaining or seeking compensation.
‘Like many hard working ns this came as second nature to my parents who just wanted the best future for their four children.’
The crisis in the Middle East has exposed fractures within the Labor Party over the issue.
Israel launched a ground invasion of Gaza after the Palestinian paramilitary group Hamas – designated by as a terrorist organisation – killed 1,200 people and took 250 hostages on October 7.
Israel’s retaliatory action in Gaza has killed more than 35,000 people and injured 77,000 others, according to the Palestinian health ministry.
Israel has emphatically rejected the use of the term genocide, saying its war was against Hamas militants in Gaza, not civilians, and precautions were being taken to reduce casualties.
But Ms Payman plainly described the conflict as a genocide, saying: ‘Instead of advocating for justice, I see our leaders performatively gesture defending the oppressor’s right to oppress.’
She said they are ‘gaslighting the global community about the rights of self-defence.
‘My conscience has been uneasy for far too long and I must call this out for what it is,’ she said. ‘This is a genocide and we need to stop pretending otherwise.
‘The lack of clarity, the moral confusion, the indecisiveness is eating at the heart of this nation. From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.’