Friends Down Under: Stand With Senator Fatima Payman (if you can!)

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Rebel with a cause: inside the moment Fatima Payman quit the Labor party

Daniel Hurst and Sarah Basford Canales Thu 4 Jul 2024 16.00 BST The Guardian

On Thursday, after weighing her future, Payman had found her voice. Australia’s first-ever hijab-wearing senator – whose family fled the Taliban in Afghanistan when she was a young child – informed the waiting press that she had made her decision with a heavy heart but a clear conscience.

My family did not flee from a war-torn country to come here as refugees for me to remain silent when I see atrocities inflicted on innocent people,” the former WA Young Labor president said, resolute as the glare of the TV lights shone on her.

Witnessing our government’s indifference to the greatest injustice of our times makes me question the direction the party is taking.”

The senator confessed that recent weeks had been “very difficult” on a personal level.

That has included “receiving death threats and emails that were quite confronting, especially when it involves my family and saying all sorts of awful things”. She had posted an example of that on social media back on 11 June. Someone had sent her a photo of her from the newspaper, with a target drawn on her face. The words scrawled on the page said “we are after you/family” and used the slur “you Muslim bitch”.

Payman became emotional when she described how she felt “deeply torn”. She was torn, she said, between Labor’s grassroots members calling on her to “hang in there” and the party leadership in Canberra that didn’t tolerate dissent from caucus unity. “I see no middle ground and my conscience leaves me no choice.”

She was also asked about her religion. “Can you elaborate, senator, on the suggestion that you are being guided by God in your decision making and will you campaign on, sort of, other Islamic, Muslim-type of issues?

Payman remained extremely composed. She paused for a second, smiled ever so slightly and rolled forward on the balls of her feet. “I don’t know how to respond to that question without feeling offended or insulted that just because I am a visibly Muslim woman that I would only care about Muslim issues,” she countered.

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