Both my son Franz and I have been arrested, separately, for suspected thought crimes relating to Palestine and Israel.

We dared to display in public the words, “from the river to the sea”, using or displaying such words now being illegal in Queensland.

I say “thought crimes” because neither of our displays mentioned Palestine or Israel. So obviously they can only conclude we must have been illegally thinking the “wrong thoughts” about this conflict.

• READ MORE: Dorothy Day House raided by police over ‘From the River to the Sea’ banner
• ‘From the river to the sea’ is being outlawed in Queensland. How will the slogan’s ban work, and will it be challenged?
• ‘From the river to the sea’: What does the Palestinian slogan really mean?
• Other Palestine reports

For nearly two years a group of us have been gathering weekly outside the office of Boeing in Brisbane, to draw attention to their terrorist activity in making missiles, fighter jets, attack helicopters and other weapons of mass destruction, used in present conflicts, especially the Gaza genocide.

When the Queensland government made it illegal to use the words “From the River to the Sea” in public, I went to the usual Wednesday action with a large placard saying “From the River to the Sea, Brisbane will be Free — of Boeing”.

Eventually police came and arrested me. My arresting officer asked me what the words on the banner meant. I gave him a good rave about Boeing and why we wanted them nowhere in Brisbane, from the river to the sea.

He took a while trying to get me to “incriminate” myself by making reference to Palestine etc. Eventually, after exposing the farcical nature of the law, I was happy do so.

Interrogated by ‘anti-terrorism squad’
He took me to the watchhouse where I was interrogated about my thought crimes by the “Anti-terrorism squad” (that is not a joke by the way).

This gave me a good chance to explain why we wanted Boeing out of Brisbane, and a lot more — about free speech, terrorism, nonviolence, etc. After an hour and a half they let me go.

I go to court on the April 14.

Now, 42 hours later at 7am, the same ever vigilant anti-terrorism squad raided Dorothy Day house of hospitality, with a team of eight officers.

Franz immediately confessed to his thought crimes, and actual crimes of displaying a banner on the side of the house reading, “From the river to the sea — come and get us [Premier] Crisafulli”.

Now I guess it is an exaggeration to call this elite squad “ever vigilant”, as the banner had been on the wall of the house for over a week. And, being on a main road and very visible from said road, there is no telling how many innocent citizens may have been infected by the thought crimes emanating from it.

Once at Dorothy Day house, the police searched all the rooms for? Hmm, illegal thinking maybe.

Phone and laptop confiscated
Anyhow, as I said, Franz broke down and confessed, so they eventually left everyone else alone. They confiscated Franz’s phone and laptop — probably the main reason for the raid.

They also took the banner and the very paints used to commit the crime. I asked Franz if they took the paper placed under the banner during the painting process. But they did not.

Now, they could find out a lot of information from Franz’s phone and laptop. They could find out who were being infected by these thought crimes, and how far they were spreading.

Perhaps they could investigate the words of the songs on Franz’s laptop sung by his church choir, to see if there was anything about rivers or seas. Perhaps, with names and phone numbers of his fellow choir members they could instigate more raids. (I know for a fact some choir members weren’t even born in Australia!)

In the end the police told Franz they would let him know next Tuesday, if or what he would be charged with.

You can read the ABC news report of the raid of Dorothy Day house here. You can also see him interviewed on Brisbane’s Channel Ten news on March 20 (if you can find it — ABC Tiktok video removed).

So there you have it. Another week in the state’s never ending battle against terrorism. Or is it a battle against a few pathetic people who believe they are the ones resisting terrorism?

Is it terrorism to say “from the river to the sea”, or is it terrorism to slaughter tens of thousands of innocents with the help of Boeing, Pine Gap and the Australian government? You decide.

Jim Dowling is a human rights, free speech and anti-war activist from Brisbane, Australia.

Body parts and debris were hauled from waters near Indonesia’s capital Jakarta today from a Boeing passenger plane that crashed shortly after take off with 62 people on board, reports The Jakarta Post.

The Sriwijaya Air Boeing 737-500 plunged into a steep dive about four minutes after it left Soekarno-Hatta international airport in Jakarta on Saturday afternoon.

No reasons have yet been given for the crash, with authorities focusing on a frantic search and rescue effort that appeared to offer no hope of finding any survivors.

• READ MORE: Indonesia’s deadliest air crashes in recent years

“As of this morning, we’ve received two (body) bags, one with passenger belongings and the other with body parts,” Jakarta police spokesman Yusri Yunus told Metro TV.

The discovery came as a flotilla of warships, helicopters and divers were deployed off the coast of the sprawling city.

Sixty-two passengers and crew were on board, including 10 children, all of them Indonesians, according to authorities.

Sriwijaya Air flight SJ182 was bound for Pontianak city on Indonesia’s section of Borneo island, about 90 minutes flying time over the Java Sea.

Crashed in Java Sea
It crashed in the Java Sea near popular day-trip tourist islands just off the coast.

Distraught relatives waited nervously for news at Pontianak airport on Saturday night.

“I have four family members on the flight — my wife and three children,” Yaman Zai said as he sobbed.

“(My wife) sent me a picture of the baby today…How could my heart not be torn into pieces?”

Officials said today they would continue their search by sea and air while also using sonar radar to pick up more signs of the downed jet.

Divers marked at least three sites at the suspected crash site with orange ballons, according to an Agence France-Presse reporter on the scene.

“From our observation, it is strongly believed the coordinates match the ones from the plane’s last signal contact,” said Hadi Tjahjanto, head of Indonesia’s military.

Hundreds of personnel from search and rescue, the navy, the police, with 10 warships also taking part in the search effort.

Sudden dive
Data from FlightRadar24 said the plane reached an altitude of nearly 3,350m before dropping suddenly to 100m. It then lost contact with air traffic control.

Indonesian Transport Minister Budi Karya Sumadi said Saturday that the jet appeared to deviate from its intended course just before it disappeared from radar.

Sriwijaya Air, which has about 19 Boeing jets that fly to destinations in Indonesia and Southeast Asia, has said only that it was investigating the loss of contact.

It did not immediately comment when contacted by AFP again on Sunday.

In October 2018, 189 people were killed when a Lion Air Boeing 737 MAX jet slammed into the Java Sea about 12 minutes after take-off from Jakarta on a routine one-hour flight.

That crash – and a subsequent fatal flight in Ethiopia – saw Boeing hit with $2.5 billion in fines over claims it defrauded regulators overseeing the 737 MAX model, which was grounded worldwide following the two deadly crashes.

The jet that went down Saturday is not a MAX model and was 26 years old, according to authorities.

No immediate insights
In its initial statements on Saturday’s crash, Boeing offered no immediate insights into the cause.

“We are aware of media reports from Jakarta regarding Sriwijaya Air flight SJ-182. Our thoughts are with the crew, passengers, and their families,” the US-based planemaker said in a statement.

“We are in contact with our airline customer and stand ready to support them during this difficult time.”

Indonesia’s aviation sector has long suffered from a reputation for poor safety, and its airlines were once banned from entering US and European airspace.

In 2014, an AirAsia plane crashed with the loss of 162 lives.

Domestic investigators’ final report on the AirAsia crash showed a chronically faulty component in a rudder control system, poor maintenance and the pilots’ inadequate response were major factors in what was supposed to be a routine flight from the Indonesian city of Surabaya to Singapore.

A year later, in 2015, more than 140 people, including people on the ground, were killed when a military plane crashed shortly after takeoff in Medan on Sumatra island.