The value of NZ’s moral currency is rapidly reducing

Monday, 20 April 2026

Then Minister of Foreign Affairs Murray McCully, right, welcomes United States Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to Wellington in 2010. McCully was told in 2016 by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that supporting UN Security Council Resolution 2334 would be a “declaration of war”. The resolution, adopted in 2017, reinforced “New Zealand’s reputation as an independent, fair-minded voice on the international stage”, Donna Miles writes.

Donna Miles is an Iranian-Kiwi columnist and writer based in Christchurch, and a regular opinion contributor.

OPINION: As a young New Zealander, backpacking around the world, my husband tells me, he could hold his head high knowing his country had no history of carrying out acts of aggression against foreign people, and that it interacted with the world with fairness and courage.

When New Zealand said “no” to nuclear weapons - choosing principle over alignment with the United States - it did so in the face of real fears of economic retaliation and trade sanctions.

New Zealand also said no to apartheid in South Africa and was a key co-sponsor (the only Western co-sponsors) of UN Security Council Resolution 2334, which condemned Israeli illegal settlement expansion in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.

At the time, furious Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told the then Foreign Minister, Murray McCully, that supporting the resolution would be a “declaration of war” and temporarily recalled Israel’s ambassador to New Zealand. The high-profile resolution passed, reinforcing New Zealand’s reputation as an independent, fair-minded voice on the international stage. That reputation was our soft power, our moral currency abroad.

But under Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Foreign Minister Winston Peters, that moral currency is rapidly depreciating as New Zealand drifts away from its tradition of independent foreign policy.

The shift has been most glaring in the Middle East, where the Government’s response to the US-Israeli war on Iran and the parallel relentless assault on Lebanon has been one of calculated silence and alignment with the aggressors, the US and Israel. In doing so, New Zealand has joined an ever-shrinking club of Western nations too gutless to call out clear acts of aggression and violations of international law.

Consider the record: On March 1, Luxon and Peters issued a statement that effectively endorsed the opening salvoes of the US-Israeli bombing campaign against Iran (as a reminder, the opening strikes hit a primary school, killing 165 schoolgirls). They condemned Iran’s retaliatory missile attacks, but there was no equivalent condemnation of the initial aggression, no demand for de-escalation, no reference to the mounting civilian toll.

When President Trump later issued his chilling threat that “a whole civilisation will die tonight” if a deal was not reached to end the conflict, Peters - fresh from a high-profile trip to Washington to meet Secretary of State Marco Rubio - refused to make a comment. That silence spoke volumes.

The same week, New Zealand confirmed it would join a 34-nation meeting convened to reopen and secure the Strait of Hormuz. While Peters insisted New Zealand was not rushing to contribute military forces, the diplomatic move was unmistakably designed to appease the US.

To make matters worse, and much to our country’s shame, New Zealand was absent from a joint statement issued by 10 countries in response to the war in the Middle East.

Canada, the UK, Australia, Japan and six others expressed deep concern over the worsening humanitarian crisis in Lebanon and called for an “urgent end to hostilities” following Israel’s major escalation, but New Zealand chose to be silent.

A resident walks among debris inside a mosque destroyed in an Israeli airstrike in Jibchit, southern Lebanon, on Friday, following a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah.

This failure to join long-standing allies in a measured call for de-escalation was another step away from the independent stance that once defined us.

Meanwhile, the human cost of the war the Government refuses to name as illegal continues to mount. Prior to the announcement of a 10-day ceasefire late last week, Israeli strikes against Lebanon killed thousands of civilians and displaced more than 1.2 million people - roughly one-sixth of the population. Bridges over the Litani River have been systematically obliterated, severing southern Lebanon from humanitarian aid, food and medical care. Entire neighbourhoods in Beirut and southern towns lie in rubble. The illegality of Israel’s actions is now undeniable and it has become obvious to the entire world that Israel is creating a Gaza 2.0 by flattening southern Lebanon.

In Iran, the picture is equally grim. US and Israeli strikes hit civilian infrastructure on a massive scale: more than 90,000 homes damaged or destroyed, hundreds of hospitals and medical facilities crippled, schools and residential blocks reduced to rubble. Steel and pharmaceutical factories, oil depots, power plants, and water facilities have been targeted, triggering power outages, pollution and economic devastation estimated in the hundreds of billions of dollars. Thousands of Iranian civilians have died; tens of thousands more have been injured or displaced; many historical sites have been damaged. The Government’s refusal to call out the brutality of these actions and label them as illegal defies belief.

This is not the New Zealand that once earned global respect. It is not the country that railed against apartheid and championed disarmament. Helen Clark and others who built New Zealand’s independent brand have called the Government’s stance a “disgrace”. Yet the coalition Government continues to prioritise alignment with the United States over the principled multilateralism that once set us apart.This may buy short-term favour in Washington, but it comes at the steep price of our national character and international reputation.