By Dominic Giannini in Canberra

An ex-Israeli minister was barred from entering Australia for a speaking tour on the grounds she could “seriously undermine social cohesion”, the immigration minister says.

The visa application by Ayelet Shaked, who was minister from 2015 to 2019, was rejected by Tony Burke, who cited her past public comments about Palestinians.

Ms Shaked and some Australian Jewish groups branded the decision as anti-Semitic, while Israel’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Oren Marmorstein said it was unacceptable.

Mr Burke defended the visa rejection on Sunday, saying it would have applied if there were issues with comments about Jews as well as Palestinians.

The fact Ms Shaked applied for a visa for a speaking tour, rather than a visitor visa, meant there were further considerations, he added.

Mr Burke pointed to her past comments that Palestinians should leave Gaza, areas in Gaza should be turned into a soccer field and Palestinian children were “little snakes”.

“If somebody wanted to come here and had previously said that they had nominated specific cities in Israel and said they should be completely levelled, I wouldn’t give them a visa to come here and make speeches,” Mr Burke told Sky News.

“If someone previously had made comments about Israelis and had described Israelis using terms like being like an octopus or being like reptiles or something horrific like that, there’s no way I’d let them in the country.”

The minister also said that a former head of the Israeli air force had recently been granted a visa and that Ms Shaked wasn’t coming to Australia as a representative of the Israeli government.

“I have been refusing a large number of visas and my department’s been refusing visas of people who want to come here to talk about the conflict if we think that they are going to seriously undermine social cohesion when they’re here,” he said.

“If there’s one comment I hear all the time, it’s (Australians) don’t want the hatred from overseas imported here.

“Whether those hatreds are demeaning of Israelis or demeaning of Palestinians, I’m going to have the exact same hard line.”

Mr Burke also argued freedom of speech proponents didn’t make the same argument when he knocked back visas for people with a history of anti-Semitic comments.

“My view is really simple,” he said.

“If you’re simply coming here to demean people we can do without you.”