Antisemitic incidents rose in Australia by over 300% since October 7 - report

Anti-Jewish incidents in Australia rose by 316% since October 7 compared to the previous 12-month period, according to an Executive Council of Australian Jewry report.

The ECAJ Report on Anti-Jewish Incidents in Australia 2024, published on Sunday, reported that from October 1, 2023, until September 30, 2024, 2,062 anti-Jewish incidents were logged by community security groups, local Jewish organizations, and the ECAJ. In the preceding comparable 12-month period in 2023, there had been 495 anti-Jewish incidents, according to the group’s data.

Australia saw 65 anti-Jewish physical assaults in the year, according to ECAJ, including that of a 44-year-old Jewish man who was called a “Jew dog” and gang beaten by three men in a Sydney Park on October 28, 2023, leaving him hospitalized with two black eyes, a concussion, and four fractures to his spine.

In another incident, an identifiably Jewish boy was called a “dirty Jew” and slapped in the face by a group of teens in Perth in October 2023. In the previous 12-month period, there had only been anti-Jewish physical assaults in the country.

Thirty percent of the year’s incidents were of verbal abuse and harassment, many of which called for the death of the Jews as a people. Among these 622 incidents the November 6 2023 incident in which occupants of a vehicle shouted “kill the Jews” at a group of visibly Jewish people at a Melbourne pro-Israel rally.

In the same city, on December 7, 2023, an identifiably Jewish resident was approached by a man who yelled at him “F*** Jews. F*** you, Jew. We’re gonna get you all.” ECAJ recorded separately the 283 threatening messages and statements, such as an October 11 2023 bomb threat conveyed through Instagram direct messages warning a Melbourne synagogue “We will blow your building up and cut your heads off soon. Gas a Jew.”

ECAJ recorded 29 incidents of vandalism and 393 incidents of graffiti in 2024. The data classified all malicious damage and destruction to property as vandalism, with EJAC providing the March 22 example of a Melbourne synagogue window being smashed with rocks.

Graffiti recorded in the report often involved pen, paint, or engravings calling for violence against Jews or references to the Holocaust. The home of a New South Wales rabbi was graffitied on November 10, 2023, with the words “kill the Jews.”

The most common classification of anti-Jewish incidents included antisemitic materials and chants. There were 670 incidents involving posters, placards, stickers, and protest chants in Australia in 2024. Outside the Sydney Opera House on October 9, a mob reportedly chanted “F*** the Jews,” “Where’s the Jews,” and “Gas the Jews!”The Australian states most impacted by the rise of antisemitic violence, according to ECAJ’s data, were Victoria and New South Wales, with 905 and 795 anti-Jewish incidents respectively.

ECAJ did not include anti-Israel incidents in the data unless there was a clear element of Jewish people or sites being targeted for their identity, there were clear calls or acts of violence or used classic antisemitic tropes.

Inquiry on antisemitism

On Friday, the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights held an inquiry on antisemitism at Australian universities. The purpose of the inquiry was to explore the prevalence of antisemitic activity at academic institutions and their policies and practices for addressing this problem. The committee followed an October Senate inquiry into the issue.

EJAC submitted their opinion to the inquiry, warning that before the senate inquiry, universities had failed to properly address antisemitism and the concerns of students, downplaying complaints, tolerating disruptions even if they included antisemitic rhetoric, and offering ineffective security and support. Since the initial Senate inquiry, EJAC said there had been “modest” improvements but they still were receiving reports of escalating violent rhetoric on campuses.

The Jewish organization called on Australian universities to take greater accountability for antisemitic conduct by publishing reports on incidents. EJAC asserted that part of the problem was that universities had no framework for identifying antisemitism and called for the widespread adoption of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance definition of antisemitism.

The EJAC submission laid out 10 recommendations, contending that there was a need for more expansive complaint systems, university training on antisemitism, the establishment of a racist incident database and hotline, and that there be a legal requirement for sources of funding to be disclosed by academic institutions.

University of Sydney Vice-Chancellor and President Prof. Mark Scott acknowledged to the committee that the institution didn’t “get everything right” the previous year, and noted that there were differing views on their response to events such as the campus encampment protest. Scott said the university had held an independent review of policies, and endorsed actions taken by the campus to create strict protest guidelines and update their complaints system.

“We have already made a significant number of changes to our policies, procedures, and practices,” Scott said in his opening statement. “Those changes have a particular focus on addressing antisemitism and the experiences of our Jewish students and staff and, in addressing cultural bias of every kind, we believe they benefit the whole university community.”