Lebanese-Australian Muslims say they are hurt and angered by Immigration Minister Peter Dutton’s suggestion that allowing them into the country was a mistake.

Mr Dutton also said last week that former prime minister Malcolm Fraser “did make mistakes in bringing some people in” as part of his immigration policies in the 1970s.

The mosque in Sydney’s Lakemba, home to many of Australia’s Lebanese community. Photo: AAP.

Jihad Dib, a Lebanese Muslim Australian and the Labor Member for Lakemba in NSW, said it was wrong for the Liberal Party to “generalise”.

“It’s ill thought of and the purpose I think is solely to try to appeal to a nationalistic sense — that’s to provide a sense of exclusion rather than one of inclusion.”

“And our strength is in our diversity, in our inclusive Australia that we all create. ”

Mr Dib said Mr Dutton’s words were counterproductive to “all of the good work that’s been going on — particularly in terms of inclusion, in terms of harmony, and in terms of shaping Australia for what it truly is”.

Dutton’s comments ‘upsetting’ and ‘ignorant’

In Lakemba, 15 kilometres south-west of Sydney’s CBD, many Lebanese-Muslims have settled in after moving to Australia, mostly in the 1970s and ’80s.

There are also large numbers of Lebanese-Muslims who were born in Australia — including 42-year-old Jasmin, who found Mr Dutton’s remarks in Parliament “really upsetting”.

“My father came out here first in the ’60s, he was only 20 years old,” she said.

“My mother followed him in 1970. They got married, had us children and we stayed in Australia to make a life.”

Jasmin said she and her family felt lucky to call themselves Australians, and that they just happened to come from a Lebanese-Muslim background.

“I don’t wear the hijab, but that doesn’t stop me from having the faith,” she said.

“I mean, I treat everybody fairly, respect every other person’s religion… we’re all the same, really, in the end.”

“He’s really ignorant, because he’s probably basing that on the extremists that you hear on the news who identify themselves as Muslims, who I believe are not Muslims.”

Mr Dutton told Parliament most of those recently charged with terrorism were the children and grandchildren of Lebanese migrants.

“The advice I have is that out of the last 33 people who have been charged with terrorist-related offences in this country, 22 of those people are from second and third generation Lebanese-Muslim background,” he said.

– ABC