On this page we publish events, actions and rallies being held by the progressive movements across Australia.
Have an event you'd like to promote? You can send us an email and we can publish it for you, or you can log in to the SEARCH website as a guest and put your event in a comment below. To log in just click on the person icon next to the Donate button at the top right of the page.
You can find out about upcoming and recorded SEARCH events here
Protest Israel’s President Herzog! War criminals not welcome here!
Monday 9 February 2026 at 17.30 AEDT at Sydney Town Hall
It is hard to imagine, but the Australian Government, despite all the talk of social cohesion, and despite passing new hate speech laws, is planning to welcome to this country Israel's President Isaac Herzog from 9-12 February.
Herzog has been found by the UN commission of inquiry to have personally "incited the commission of genocide" through his abhorrent comments justifying the widespread killing of Palestinian civilians in Gaza. He is not a faith or cultural leader of the Jewish community, but a politician and the official head of the Israeli state, which has now admitted to killing at least 71,000 people in Gaza, in what is widely held to be an ongoing genocide. Herzog opposes the recognition or creation of a Palestinian state, and supports illegal Israeli West Bank settlements.
Far from helping to combat antisemitism in the wake of the horrific Bondi attack, many Jewish organisations have expressed their opposition to Herzog's visit, both for his role in the Gaza genocide, and the danger that his visit, by seeking to further conflate Jewish people with the state of Israel, may in fact exacerbate antisemitism.
We call for:
- The Australian Government to rescind the invitation to Isaac Herzog to visit Australia.
- Herzog, if he lands in Australia, to be arrested and investigated for alleged breaches of Australian and international law covering genocide and hate speech.
- The Australian Government to sanction Israel and end the two-way arms trade.
- The scrapping of anti-protest laws.
Spread the word and be there!
Despite Chris Minns' best efforts, it is still completely legal to gather for a mass, peaceful assembly.
A panel of feminist academics and poets discuss the politics of displacement, colonisation and the impact of diasporic trauma on Australian culture ... featuring a SEARCH member
Heroic Horizons:
Diasporas of Celtic immigrants to Australia
Sat 31 Jan 3pm – 5pm AEDT
Waverley Library, Bondi Junction NSW, Australia
Heroic Horizons brings together four women poets whose work interrogates the cultural, emotional, and historical legacies of Irish and Scottish migration to Australia. Through poetry and performance, this event traces diasporic journeys shaped by displacement, endurance, inheritance, and imagination, situating Celtic migration within the broader context of colonial Australian history.
Drawing on archival research, family histories, folklore, and lived experience, poets Linda Adair, Anne Casey, Annemaree Daziel, and Melita Rowston explore how language, land, memory, and identity are carried across oceans and generations. Their works reflect on what is preserved, what is transformed, and what is lost in the process of settlement, while also acknowledging the complex realities of colonial presence on unceded Aboriginal lands.
The program foregrounds poetry and art as a critical and creative method — a means of questioning inherited narratives of heroism, survival, and belonging, while opening space for nuance, ambiguity, and dialogue. Performance elements further animate the spoken word, offering audiences an embodied encounter with history that is both personal and collective.
Presented as part of the Brigid the Bard Festival, Heroic Horizons invites audiences to listen deeply to stories shaped by migration and to consider how diasporic Celtic identities continue to influence contemporary Australian culture. This event is both a celebration of poetic craft and a thoughtful examination of the cultural horizons that emerge when histories intersect.
The event is to be hosted by Angela Stretch, Poetry Sydney.
For more details, including artist statements and to book tickets, go to https://events.humanitix.com/heroic-horizons-diasporas-of-celtic-immigrants-to-australia
Myanmar update: sham elections under military rule
Myanmar’s military junta is going ahead with staged elections designed to entrench its grip on power, not restore democracy.
The so-called election is being rolled out in 3 phases: The first on 28 December, followed by 11 January and 25 January. The initial round saw a low turnout reflecting widespread fear and rejection among the Myanmar people.
No democratic guarantees
These polls are fundamentally illegitimate. As U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres stated, "I don't think anybody believes that those elections will be free and fair."
Under the current conditions, genuine democratic participation is impossible:
- The National League for Democracy (NLD), the party of the democratically elected government, has been dissolved
- Dozens of pro-democracy parties have been bannedor forced to withdraw.
- Criticising the elections is illegal.
- Voting will not be nationwide; it will take place in only 265 of Myanmar’s 330 townships.
Despite these realities, junta spokesperson Zaw Min Tun has claimed the polls will improve Myanmar’s international relations.
Australia must act
The Australian Government has expressed their concerns about the election, but we need stronger measures. Now is the time to escalate targeted sanctions against the military junta and its business interests, and to stand clearly with Myanmar’s democracy movement, trade unions and civil society.
We need your support. Add your name to the petition calling on Australia to escalate sanctions on Myanmar’s junta:
Together with Australian trade unions, civil society organisations, faith groups, international development organisations, and the Myanmar diaspora, we sent an open letter to the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Penny Wong.
Read the open letter to Foreign Minister Penny Wong urging stronger action.
International action is key to delegitimising the junta. Please sign, share, and help keep the pressure on.
FOLLOW US @UNIONAIDABROAD FOR THE LATEST GLOBAL SOLIDARITY NEWS AND EVENTS
WORLD BEYOND WAR IS CALLING FOR A GLOBAL DAY OF ACTION TO SHOW SUPPORT FOR LATIN AMERICA
Create or take part in actions all over the World on 17 January 2026
CLICK HERE:
https://worldbeyondwar.org/jan17
Sign the Petition
Read, sign, and share the petition: VENEZUELA: No War, No Overthrow, No Coup, No Sanctions / Ni guerra, ni derrocamiento, ni golpe, ni sanciones.
https://worldbeyondwar.org/venezuela-no-war/?clear_id=true
State Library of NSW, Library Auditorium
on Monday 10 November 2025 at 6--7pm
The Australian Wars
Uncover the true history of our nation with Stephen Gapps, David Marr and Rachel Perkins.
This is the first book to tell the story of the continental sweep of massacres, guerilla warfare and resistance – the sovereignty of an entire country at stake.
The Australian Wars is a new book conceived by filmmaker Rachel Perkins following her award-winning documentary. This book uncovers the true history of a nation steeped in bloody battles that have reverberated from the past to the present.
Join contributors Stephen Gapps, David Marr and Rachel Perkins for the launch of The Australian Wars and a rousing call to truth-telling on a national scale.
Presented by Sydney Writers' Festival.
Stephen Gapps
Stephen Gapps is a historian working to bring the Australian Frontier Wars into broader public recognition. In 2011 Stephen won a NSW Premier’s History Award for his book Cabrogal to Fairfield City: A history of a multicultural community. His 2018 title The Sydney Wars: Conflict in the early colony, 1788–1817 won the 2019 Les Carlyon Literary Prize. In 2021 Stephen published Gudyarra: The First Wiradyuri War of Resistance –the Bathurst War 1822–1824 and in 2025, Uprising: War in the Colony of NSW 1838–1844. Stephen is a historian at Artefact Heritage and Environment and Adjunct Lecturer at Charles Sturt University.
David Marr
David Marr is a journalist and broadcaster who writes for The Guardian. He’s published a couple of biographies and a number of books about politics, censorship and immigration. Over the last 10 years he has written a number of Quarterly Essays. His latest is The White Queen: One Nation and the Politics of Race. He previously presented Media Watch and appears regularly on Insiders and The Drum. His most recent book is Killing for Country: A Family Story.
Rachel Perkins
Rachel Perkins is a filmmaker with a career spanning documentary, TV drama and movies. Her Australian Aboriginal heritage (Arrernte/Kalkadoon) has inspired much of her work including The Australian Wars documentary series which she wrote and directed and which was commissioned by SBS and produced by Blackfella Films. Other notable documentary work includes the First Australians and Blood Brothers. Her fiction work includes the TV dramas Total Control, Mystery Road and Redfern Now and the movies Jasper Jones, Mabo, Bran Nue Dae, One Night the Moon and Radiance. She spends her time between her traditional country of Mparntwe (Alice Springs) and Sydney.
REGISTER FOR THIS EVENT:
https://www.swf.org.au/program/season-2025-2026/the-australian-wars
