Sharri | 6 March

Why on Sky News.

This is Sharry Good Evening.

Major news tonight as Tony Burke is forced to cancel the visa of a Hesbella supporter at the eleventh hour after our revelations. This as we further expose this preachers links to Australians our exclusive in a moment, Cyclone Alfred continues its terrifying approach towards Brisbane. We'll get full coverage from meteorologists and our reporters on the ground, and despite the natural disaster, Albanezi refuses to rule out calling the election this weekend.

Matt Canavan and Adam Crichton will be here in a minute.

Also tonight, Donald Trump's warning to her mus after meeting with hostages in the White House. First, let's have a look at this major national security story. The Home Affairs Department has canceled the visa of a pro Hasbela preacher at the eleventh hour after our relations last night. Who's saying Mackie was set to arrive in Australia within days fresh from attending the funeral of terror Lada Hassan Azrala, he called one of the world's greatest freedom fighters. If

Palestinian history. When things go very quiet and everyone seems to think that it's all over, people come out to resist. Palestinians come out to resist. But you know, my favorite

Despite all of this, and despite praising Nasrallah and attending his funeral, Mackie was set to arrive for a speaking tour of Melbourne and Sydney any.

Day now, a couple of days, I'll be in Melbourne and Sydney and I'll see all you guys there in Shulah.

Well after our report last night, there was outrage in the Jewish community that former Israeli government minister IoLET Shakhed had her visa canceled but not this Heswela supporting preacher. The Australian Jewish Association said, so a senior former minister from Israel's most diverse government is banned by Labor, but a pro terrorist Islamic preacher is welcomed to Australia. By now, everyone knows that Labour would sell their grandmothers for a few extra Western Sydney votes.

But this is next level.

And Jewish community advocate Marnie Peerlstein said, please explain Australia how IoLET Shakhed, former Israel Minister of Justice, was denied a visa to Australia, but Hussein Macki, who just attended Hesblaalider Hassan Nasrala's funeral, gets to come and do us speaking to her, we called on Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke last night to cancel this visa in the interest of social cohesion and national security. But Tony Burke told

Macki will not be arriving in Australia now.

To be clear, I've since learned that this was a decision that Tony Burke.

Had nothing to do with. It was made by his department, and.

Tony Burke wouldn't even comment on this today, despite the fact he spoke in quite strong terms about Alette Shakehad's visa ban. He said that he was concerned she'd undermine social cohesion. But nothing from Tony Burke today on this visa conselation, not one comment.

Now.

Macki declined to respond to our questions yesterday, but then today he posted to social media that he was the subject of a smear campaign. He said Sky News ran a smear campaign against me to get me banned from Australia, and he complained about Zionist accounts tweeting Tony Burke non stop to pressure him, et cetera, et cetera, and encouraged his followers to contact Tony Burke. But when I contacted Hussain Macki yesterday, he did get my questions and he blocked me from his Instagram account.

He just didn't answer them, didn't respond.

Now, over the past two weeks we've exposed a collection of pro Hasbilist supporters in Australia and now tonight we can reveal the connections between Mackie another Australians. Here's Maki with one Australian who we revealed attended the funeral of Nasrallah Hassan Jeba. That image was taken in Iraq, we believe in August last year. As you may recall from our reporting last week, Jaba was prominent at pro Palestinian rallies here in Sydney. Then here's Maki with Aberd al

To be canceled.

He said no one who attended Nasralla's funeral should be welcome in Australia well now tonight. Patterson says this raises questions about the other Australians who attended the funeral.

What is being done about the Australian citizens who were identified again by Sky News attending Hassan Israela's funeral in Lebanon several weeks ago. Some of them have now returned to Australia. What is being done about them? Are they being investigated for associating with the listed terrorist organize? Why didn't the government use the temporary exclusion powers to keep them offshore while those investigations could take place?

And He's right the visa cancelation is an acknowledgment that attending an event organized by a terror group is a problem. As your Director General Mike Burgers said just last week that attending overseas terror events would be concerning.

As a security service, I'd be regardless of whether it's listed or not. If they were going to an event, whether were vile extremists or known terrorists, we would be interested as Australia's security service.

Yet we still haven't heard anything from Tony Burke about what is going to do with the individuals that we've reported. We've named and shamed them, we've exposed them who attended the funeral. Tony Burke has been accused of having a clear conflict of interest here.

He elected of Watson, has a.

Large Muslim community who he needs to vote him back in as he comes under pressure from the Muslim Votes movement.

But he's also Home Affairs Minister.

He's in charge of all of our national security. He's in charge of counter terrorism and Hezbelah is a listed terror organization, whether he likes it or not, so his department had to take action here today.

But you compare his lack of.

Leadership with what we're seeing right now. In the United States, President Donald Trump met with some former hostages in the Oval Office in this emotional meeting.

You will take it to roddor Vison Earth.

So this hell and just the worst thing that anybody can go through.

By other days, they handcuff one of the boys that is with us.

Emily Kine and.

Akata and Kata's heir.

And smile.

They used to eat in front of us. Well they stopped us.

It's a miracle, the family out of yourself.

Believe you've been sent by a island.

It's recently.

Thank you. Thanks here were good for you. We're alive, freakly for girls. Thank you, thank you, thank you so much. I've never had anything like this.

I mean, I've saved a lot of people, but I've never.

Seen anything like this where you lived under those conditions.

What a powerful meeting.

And as you heard there, many of the hostages thanked Trump, saying that they believed if it weren't for him, they'd still be in captivity. You can't even compare Trump's moral leadership to that of our hopeless ministers like alban Easy and Burke. Trump was clearly deeply moved and troubled by the stories of torture and starvation that he heard, because after that meeting, Trump sent the strongest possible warning to Hammas.

You murdered, or it is over for you.

Only sick and twisted people keep bodies, and you are sick and twisted. He said, I'm sending Israel everything it needs to finish the job. Not a single Hummus member will be safe if you don't do as I say, and he went on. That is unwavering solidarity. That is unwavering moral clarity. This is what we've been missing from international leadership since October seventh, and we need more of it, particularly in Australia. Now tonight, we're on standby for Cyclone

Two thousand sees volunteers in the northern rivers, two hundred essential energy electricians and winesmen who are ready to reconnect power, massive resources from fire and rescue, the Australian Defence Force on.

Site, the Bureau of meteorology say winds are already high tonight, with large swells and powerful way, some as high as twelve meters. There's also predicted to be in total over eight hundred millimeters of rainfall and this could lead to both flash and riverine flooding, and both of which could be life threatening.

I've just been brief that overnight there was a wave recorded off the Gold Coast off main Beach of twelve point three meters.

Now we've never seen a wave that large.

This could mean totals of over eight hundred millimeters for this event.

In terms of flooding, that rainfall is expected to produce both flash and riverine flooding, and both of these types of flooding can be life threatening.

And speaking of flooding, we're already seeing videos like this.

Holy Now.

The cyclone was originally meant to make land for overnight tonight, but its movement has slowed and it's now set to hit the coastline overnight tomorrow. Our Sky News meteorologists were ahead of the game. If you're watching last night, you would have seen Rob Sharp tell us on air that the cyclone would arrive at twenty four hours later then forecast and now that's.

What the Bureau is saying officially as well.

Its movement has been described as erratic and here's where it's expected to first hit Australian shores between Noosa and cool and Gata early in the early hours of Saturday morning. After that, its current trajectory shows it moving west after it did stall this morning. Now, while the cyclone movement has slowed, this doesn't affect its impact, and it could even mean that the impact would intensify.

We just don't know for certain yet.

The wind speeds are expected to reach highs of one hundred and fifty kilometers an hour for gusts of wind and ninety five kilometers per hour at the center of the cyclone. The entire city of Brisbane and much of southern eastern Queensland and northern New South Wales is basically now in lockdown, with families told to stay indoors. Supermarket shelves have been stripped bare as a resident stock up ahead of the storm, with predictions that power and even

In your state?

Oh, look Shore, I think some people are a bit anxious. Of course, it's not normal for cyclones to be this far south, although it it does happen from time to time, but most people in living memory probably haven't been through one. So it's a bit anxious for people, I suppose for us up here in North Queensland, it's a common occurrence. I'm confident that Queenslanders will get through this. With that

Yeah, yeah, I think it is. You know, a lot of people are very concerned about how it's going to hit. There's also, of course, the question of whether Alban Easy will delay calling the federal election. He was poised to do that this Sunday and he was pressed on this issue today by my colleague Kieran Gilbert.

You couldn't call an election in the face of a natural disaster like this.

That's just not going to.

I mean that will that would be a tinner which you don't have.

That couldn't happen, surely, Kieran.

I'm focused on, not on votes. I'm focused on lives. I'm focused on Australians and Australians showing our character at this debuil time. You know what I've been focused on, Kieran is governing. We have a budget that we're prepared for and we put out the time.

Sounds like you're delivering the budget.

Well, we put out the timetable of that last year, Kieran.

Don't you like Kieran's framing of that question. That would be a tinier if you call the election this weekend, which I know you don't have. I don't know he doesn't have a tinier. Good on KG for pressing him on that.

Adam.

It doesn't sound like the Prime Minister's ruled out.

Calling the election if he did, especially.

With the cyclone hitting on Saturday. I mean Matt sounded a bit calm, but it could be catastrophic.

We just don't know. I mean, he can't go to the polls.

Yeah, Look that's certainly right. I think the preference for the government is not to have a budget on the twenti fefth of March because they don't want to crystallize all of the bad economic data, and so the preference is the trongth of March. But if it's a yes,

You know.

One of the other depressing things about this storm is all the lefties are jumping on it as an example of climate change, when I think the most empirical most empirical evidence suggests that the severity of these cyclones over time has actually been declined. Cyclone Alfred actually, and you know it's worth pointing out to it actually has a man's name, which is interesting. I thought all these storms are used to have women's names. Maybe this is DEI in meteorology.

I don't meant to have Anthony.

He meant to Anthony exactly that's exactly right. This was meant Anthony was the next name on the list, but then I suppose they didn't want to politicize a cyclone, so they.

Took the next name, which is Alfred.

But Adam makes an interesting point because initially cyclones were all women's names until nineteen seventy five.

That's right, of course, you know famously Cyclone Tracy. This has also been a phenomenon in the US as well, where they used to have women's names and now they have men's names.

It's DEI hitting the weather system. I'm not against it. It's fine, it's fine. Good, good to hear, Adam.

And hopefully you aren't against these lockdowns, because of course against them.

There's a sensible lockdown, sensible laws. I'm not going to last two hundred days.

I hope no.

Right alo on that I mean, I mean, Shari, the people have been the businesses. University has been closed since Wednesday. It's been perfectly fine in Brisbane. I do think there's a post COVID people are just a bit too quick to do this.

I've spoken to small businesses today or pulling the hair.

Out, I mean they suffer right like their businesses have been smashed. These last few days were perfectly fine weather in Brisbane, while big businesses public servants of course don't bear that cost. And I don't know, it just seems again for us up here in North Queens it's a bit strange to do that well ahead of a cyclone hitting.

It's no that probably going to hit till Saturday. I don't know. I don't know. Look, there's a lot of fear around there.

I hope people don't get over anxious. It's something people should be able to live through if they take reasonable precautions.

That's all we need to do.

All right.

Well, let's have a look at this statement that the Chinese Embassy in the US put on x today. They said, if war is what the US wants, be it a tariff war, a trade war, or any other type of war, we're ready to fight to the end. Well, Trump's new Defense Secretary, Pete Hegseth responded, have.

A look, we're prepared. Those who long for peace must prepare for war. That's why we're rebuilding our military. They don't seek that war. We will, and the President has sought historic peace and historic opportunities. But my job is the Secretary of defense is to make sure we're ready.

I mean, Matt kind of and I'll start with you on this, but China is basically threatening war there and at the same time we have Chinese worst warships circumnavigating our coastline.

This is alarming.

Look, I also think this is something we shouldn't overreact to. I mean, what Pete Hegseth said is pretty normal that obviously, all countries should put themselves in a position to prepare for the worst, prepare for conflict outcome. That's why you have a Department of Defense. But the Trump in particular, President Trump in particularly being very clear he doesn't want war. He wants to be a peacemaker. So I don't think anything is imminent per se. But that does raise the

But it seems to me that in the last few.

Years, particularly under this labor government, we've we've been using the excuse, the.

Fig leaf of Ucust.

To hide the deficiencies in our defense forces exist Today. August is very important. It's a good thing we're doing it, but that's going to take decades. There are things we need to do right now that are being deferred, like the purchase of the joint strike fighters that we will bring back, and instead of doing that, it's just, oh, we're doing aucust, but that's the years away.

Adam, What do you think about this?

Yeah, look, I think matters right. I think that we've dropped the ball on our defense spending for a very long time.

You know.

For instance, my understanding is the government hasn't even said where the submarine base on the East Coast is going to be, and even when they decide, that's going to take ten years to actually build a thing.

So we need to do that urgently.

Yeah.

Look, the most famous front page for me from the Australian last year was when we only had one operational sub in the water, just one submarine to defend the entirety of Australia. That's completely absurd. And yet the political conversation here is just so focused on stuff what I

I don't think that perception is accurate, but I agree that the message is, you know, we need to increase our defense spending absolutely all right, Adam Crichton and Matt Canavan, thank you both very much for joining me. All right, let's get straight back to cycloon Alfred now and joining me is meteorologist from Sky Newswather Alison Osborne. Allison, thanks for your time. Look how is olfread tracking right now? As we got to air Shari.

Since the system made quite an erratic stall for much of this morning, it has readopted it east It's Westwood Track rather towards the southeast Queensland coast. This evening it has retained its strength. It's a Category two system, but the impacts are already being felt. We've seen damaging wins impact parts of the Byron region in northeastern New South Wales, bringing down power lines as we can see here in Balana.

At New South Wales, so landfall is looking later than it was initially forecasts. We're now looking still in the early hours of Saturday morning. So what does that mean for everyone in the path of the storm.

Similar impacts are expected to originally forecast sharrow, but there is the risk that the rain event to follow may be prolonged exacerbatesating that risk. Now we're still tracking a coastal crossing between Nooser and cool and Gatta close to Brisbane in the early hours of Saturday morning. This will put the most destructive winds and the heaviest rains south of that system, firmly south of Brisbane at this stage, so around the Gold Coast and the Byron Coast. So

Now flood warnings.

With major flood warnings now current for the Northern Rivers and the mid North, we're likely to see that flooding really start to build from Friday night.

Charry, all right, Allis and Osborn from Sky News Weather, appreciate your time, and after the breakwcross live to Brisbane to see how the city is preparing ahead of the cyclone.

Will be with Sky News reporter Harry Clark. That's coming up in a minute.

Okay, welcome back, and let's go straight now to the suburb of Cleveland on Brisbane's Bayside. A cycle on Alfred keeps moving towards the city. Sky News report Harry Clarke is with me, Harry. What's it like on the ground at the moment?

Sharry, Well, right now, I've said it a few times, but then you know, change my tune a bit. Today it's the calm before the storm. But I said that earlier today and then all of a sudden it whips up and then calms back down again. But right now at Cleveland on Brisban's Bay side, there's just a very slight drizzle of rain and no wind, which was unlike the conditions were just about half an hour ago.

Yeah, I saw you on with Chris Kenny earlier this evening. How are locals feeling on the ground. Are people afraid? Are they anxious? What's the general sentiment?

I think a little bit anxious, But people don't seem really concerned or fearful of this weather event, Sharry. People in southeast Queensland have been through severe weather events before. Obviously there was floods as recently in recently as twenty twenty two in Brisbane and then that huge flood in twenty eleven. So it's not uncommon to be getting orders and regular updates from the Bureau of Meteorology and Weather in government authorities about staying off the roads, keeping inside,

And I think that's the thing.

Because it is further south than normal put people wouldn't be they wouldn't exactly know what to do to prepare. We've just been seeing on the screen vision of people's sandbaggings and they've been cues hours and hours long, people waiting to collect sand to protect their property. So for many people, they will be getting ready to face this cyclone for the first time in their lives. Harry, stay safe from the ground and thank you for the update.

For women's sport coming up now.

Thank you so much for watching this week, and I'll see you again Monday at eight pm.