Tony Abbott throws a Right hook

Abbott romanticises his days at Oxford - the friends, study, beer and boxing. He thrives on self-mocking stories about colliding with the British class system and offending the academic sensibilities. Listening to him one thinks immediately of Bob Hawke at Oxford, causing trouble and breaking beer-drinking records.

It is at Oxford that Abbott was imbued with British tradition and academic rituals: white bow ties, gowns and graduation ceremonies in Latin. Returning to the university this visit, he said: "There are few institutions, perhaps not even the Catholic Church, in which tradition is more respected."

There are few politicians more swayed by tradition. Abbott genuflects before tradition and his mind and senses are drawn irresistibly towards the glory of Britain. Tradition is the golden thread that unites his passions and fidelity to duty, honour, God, family, crown, Edmund Burke and Winston Churchill.

On these fronts, Abbott cannot help himself. Hence Labor's belief that he can be depicted as out of touch with contemporary Australia. This will be a pulsating theme of Julia Gillard's 2013 election tactics.

Yet Oxford saw another Abbott: the colonial gorilla in the boxing ring. Abbott became famous at university for his performance in the Oxford-Cambridge boxing match when, with the varsity battle locked 4-4 and the heavyweight bout the decider, he climbed into the ring for his first fight. He had been sick with nerves in the hours beforehand, fearing what sort of trouble lay ahead.

When the referee issued the instruction "Box!" Abbott operated on pure instinct. He applied the principle he has many times since: "Kill or be killed." He flayed his taller opponent with a flurry of blows in what participants at the event recall as hardly elegant but effective. After 45 seconds of the first round in a three-round contest, he landed a serious blow; his opponent went down, and was knocked out. A win for the colonial gorilla at his first outing.

This is the description of himself Abbott recalled in his Oxford speech the other day, referring to an Englishman's view of the bout and his remark about the Oxford upstart. At Oxford, Abbott first met George Brandis, now shadow attorney-general. Brandis was not at the fight. The British historian of the Conservative Party, Lord Blake, said at Abbott's final provost's collection: "Mr Abbott needs to temper his robust common sense with a certain philosophical doubt."

The irony is that Abbott has plenty of doubts about himself but few doubts about the values that matter in life. He has long been attracted to the observation that Oxford leaves one "magnificently unprepared for the long littleness of life."

From his Oxford days the contradiction in Abbott was already conspicuous - the Australian more loving of British tradition than the British and the Australian on an elemental rampage operating on the Darwinian "survival of the fittest" premise with brutal overtones. Both identities, traditionalist and gorilla, are basic to the Abbott political persona.

His traditional side means he can be charming, polite, self-effacing and eloquent. His gorilla side hailing from the rugby field, the pub and the boxing ring is masculinity in overdrive. Both are genuine Abbott and their fusion constitutes his mettle. This is the origin of much of the confusion about him. "He's so charming," from one woman surrenders to "he's a brute" from another.

Abbott's passion about tradition and his boxing ring aggression have been transmittted to policy. How could they not? Listen to Abbott a week ago recalling his return en route to Oxford: "When the plane bringing me back to Britain flew low up the Thames Valley and I saw for the first time as an adult Westminster Abbey, the Houses of Parliament, St Paul's Cathedral and the Tower of London, I had a sense of belonging, not because I was born here but because our culture was."

This is straight from the Sir Robert Menzies songbook. It is impossible to miss this Menzian-Abbott bond. Abbott's words recall those of Menzies when he made his first visit to London and stole out late at night to soak up the glories that he had read about since boyhood. For Abbott, the truth about our culture is laced with passion.

The text of his speech at The Queen's College, where a generation ago he was a student, says: "As my former teacher, Father Ed Campion, used to say of our country: the English made the laws, the Scots made the money and the Irish made the songs!" Abbott loves this sort of declaration. It sends a shiver of worry down the spines of some of his fellow MPs.

Given these sentiments Abbott embraces John Howard's formula that Australia does not have to choose between our history and our geography. His critics will say Abbott's love of Britain means he cannot deal with Asia. It is a nonsense, as Howard proved. Indeed, it is anti-intellectual claptrap with the implication that being versed in one culture means you cannot deal with another.

Abbott has signalled a plan to visit Indonesia first if he becomes PM. He has promised a Jakarta-focus. He says China, Japan, India and Indonesia are all "profoundly important" to Australia but what also counts are "the bonds of history, of shared values and millions of familiar attachments".

This means Abbott would seek a deeper engagement with Asia but always from the cultural framework of Australia as a Western nation. He sees this mix as a positive, not a negative. For Abbott, values arising from the British tradition, modified by the Australian "fair go" experience, are a template.

This philosophy leads to his support for the crown, his scepticism about hardline industrial relations reform that threatens the social compact, his wariness about tradition-shattering climate change action, his view that personal liberty involves personal responsibility and a foreign policy that puts a premium on traditional democratic values, meaning a fidelity to the US, Britain and Israel.

A succession of Australian luminaries have enjoyed the Oxford experience: Malcolm Fraser, Hawke, Kim Beazley and Malcolm Turnbull. Yet none has returned with the passion for tradition that Abbott exhibits. Indeed, Fraser came back with a scepticism for Britain. Hawke, in turn, was hardly an Anglophile.

Oxford, however, is a confidence booster for its Australian products. In Abbott's speech, he said Oxford had "honed a particular leadership style". He meant "the assimilation of others' best thoughts" - in short, listening to the best policy advice but having the confidence to make up your own mind independently and take responsibility for your decision.

Drawing upon his Oxford days, Abbott said: "To whom much is given, from whom much is expected." He sees tradition and obligation being tied together. This view was carried into his foreign policy pronouncements in London, notably on Israel.

Abbott knows little about Israel yet his views are fixed. This was obvious during his attendance at the Australia-UK-Israel leadership dialogue in London last week, a meeting that happened to follow the dramatic events within the Gillard cabinet that saw the PM rolled by Foreign Minister Bob Carr on the issue of Palestine's observer status at the UN.

Julia Gillard, like Abbott, believed in the "no" vote position, but she was forced to accept an Australian abstention. Abbott sees this not in terms of diplomatic merit but as a betrayal of a democratic friend. His position is defined not by global realities but values. In London, he attacked Labor's new policy and maximised its significance as a point of foreign policy difference.

At a time when the Netanyahu government in Israel is under intense global criticism for its lack of commitment to the peace process, Abbott offered Israel support, not criticism; he came to forgive Israel its mistakes and praise its democracy despite the democratic deficit involved in the control it exercises over the Palestinians.

It would be hard to find another political leader in the West as pro-Israel as Abbott.

In his speech to the dialogue gala dinner at London's Reform Club, delivered in Abbott's absence by George Brandis, the Opposition Leader said: "The Coalition maintains a complete and unshakeable commitment to Israel's security. Israel is the only mature pluralist democracy in the Middle East.

"Israel's values and courage deeply impress Australians.

"While occasionally Israel, like all countries, makes mistakes, it is a bastion of Western civilisation in a part of the world where human rights, including the value of respectful dissent, are not well appreciated. And for no other reason it is in the interest of the West to show understanding and support for Israel. If Australia or Britain had rockets regularly lobbing on to our territories, I dare say we would suddenly be a lot less particular about the moral gradations of response that we sometimes feel like imposing on Israel."

Abbott, unlike Carr, made no criticism of Benjamin Netanyahu's settlements policy. He said the Coalition opposed the policy change because "bad behaviour should not be rewarded".

He said international recognition of a Palestinian state should not be advanced until the Palestinians had endorsed Israel's right to exist behind secure borders as part of a two-state solution.

Abbott rejected Labor's view that Israel needed to be put under pressure to rethink and advance the peace process.

He said the Coalition held the orthodox stand on Israel, the position Gillard had dumped. His charge of distrust against Labor was undisguised and goes to our election to the UN Security Council.

Abbott said: "We will be watching closely to ensure that Australia's recent election to a two-year term on the UN Security Council hasn't been won at the expense of our traditional support for Israel.

"Our view is that Australia should have been supported for a term on the UN Security Council because of our values, not because we were prepared to compromise them."

Finally, Abbott savaged Carr's new policy to Inquirer, saying "we made the wrong decision and we made the wrong decision for the wrong reasons."

He alleges, in effect, that Labor's position was designed to court the Muslim vote in Sydney. This is alarming because the debate should be about "what is best for Australia's interest" not in terms of Middle Eastern "religious or political heritage".

The evidence is that Abbott is wrong on Labor's motives. Carr was driven by foreign policy, not domestic politics. While some ministers referred to the Muslim vote, the main debate was driven by foreign policy and the best means to advance the two-state solution. Abbott's position is far from welcomed by all prominent Israelis. While Netanyahu is likely to be re-elected next month, he faces intense opposition for the precise concerns that Labor holds. His record gives no grounds for any confidence about peace.

Labor's senior representative at the dialogue, Parliamentary Secretary for Defence Mike Kelly, rejected Abbott's argument and said it had been "inappropriate" for him to take such a partisan stand at the leadership dialogue.

The clash over Israel is a neat example of Abbott's political style and why Labor detests him. On display have been the two faces of Abbott - the values-based traditionalist and the old Oxford boxer looking for a fight.

On the Middle East, Abbott avoids the policy complexity and, relying upon values and principles, argues that Israel must be supported because it is a democracy that champions the traditions of Western civilisation. He then pivots to assault Labor, arguing it cannot be trusted to stand with friends or honour past commitments. Hence Labor's claims that Abbott is uninterested in policy and is relentlessly negative.

This combination, tradition and aggression, has served Abbott well, but Labor has refined its attack on his personality and is making inroads. Abbott's challenge is to offer the public a more positive view on how he relates to people. That is the missing element.