A devastating arson attack on a synagogue in Melbourne is now being investigated as a possible terror attack, drawing global attention to a sharp rise in anti-Semitism in Australia.
Masked vandals set fire to the Adass Israel Synagogue on December 6, in one of several incidents that led the Jewish community to seek support from government leaders.
On Wednesday, Sky News Australia reported that a car was destroyed after it was set on fire in a Jewish community in Sydney. At least two, but possibly as many as seven, buildings in the area were destroyed, with one graffiti tag reading “kill Israel” (sic). This outburst of hatred followed a similar incident late last month, when vehicles and a restaurant in the same area were covered in graffiti.
Following the Sydney attacks, New South Wales Premier Chris Minns told Sky News Australia: “Sydney has, per capita, the second highest number of Holocaust survivors in the world,” explaining that they “came to Australia specifically to be free from these attacks.” kind of hate.”
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Members of the Adass Israel Synagogue recover items after an arson attack on December 6, 2024 in Melbourne, Australia. (Asanka Ratnayake/Getty Images)
Worshiper Yumi Friedman shared it Avi Yemini of Rebel News that he was in the synagogue when he heard banging on the door and saw glass flying. Friedman later said he smelled fire and burned his hand while trying to open the synagogue door.
Friedman said responding police told the Jewish worshipers to lie on the ground and show their hands. “They came and arrested us,” he said. “It took a while for them to realize that we are Jewish and that we didn’t do this.”
Zionism is not a feature of the Charedi Judaism that worshipers at the Adass Israel Synagogue practice. Yemini asked community members why they thought the non-Zionist synagogue was targeted. “Jews are Jews,” replied a man wearing a yarmulke. “They are anti-Jews,” another visibly Jewish man told Yemini. “Not to anything else.”
Yemini filmed a protester outside the firebombed synagogue, wearing a keffiyeh and a baseball cap with the Palestinian flag on it, holding a sign that read “Nothing is more anti-Semitic than Zionism.”
Anti-Semitic graffiti in a Jewish neighborhood in Melbourne, Australia. (Executive Council of Australian Jewry)
Numerous community members interviewed by Yemini said they felt unsupported by the local government. “People have been attacked here,” one man reminded Victoria Police Detective Chris Murray, who was on hand to address the community. “Why don’t you put someone here?”
“We’re doing our best,” Murray replied.
Murray told the crowd that police would “do everything” to “bring these individuals to justice.” While they believed the attack was targeted, Murray said that “what we don’t know is why.”
Victoria Police Chief Commissioner Shane Patton told reporters at a news conference that the firebombing was being investigated as “a likely terrorist attack.”
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‘Free Palestine’ graffiti praising the October 7 Hamas massacre against Israelis. (Executive Council of Australian Jewry)
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has been criticized for his response to the attack in Melbourne, which a Sky News Australia presenter said was “four days too late”. Yemini documented the visit of Albanians to the Adass Israel Synagogue. When the yarmulke-wearing prime minister failed to answer questions from the assembled reporters, Yemini followed him to the car and told Albanian that “yesterday was the first time you didn’t confuse anti-Semitism and Islamophobia.”
Although the country has faced increased intolerance, Australia’s Jewish population is about one-eighth of the Muslim population, and is stagnant or declining while the percentage of Muslims has grown. According to Monash University, Jewish Australians made up 0.5% of the population in 2016. According to the University of South Australia, Muslims made up 2.6% of the population in 2016. Today, Muslims make up 3.2% of Australia’s population, while 0.4% of the population is Jewish.
In the wake of the recent attacks, Albanese stated that the Australian Federal Police would conduct an operation that would “focus on threats, violence and hatred” targeting the Jewish community. Reuters reported this that since 2022, the Albanians have allocated US$25 million (about $15 million) to increase the security of Jewish organizations. He has also worked to minimize hate speech and ban the Nazi salute.
Sign on a house that reads ‘Kill Israel’ (Fox News)
Many Jewish Australians believe these efforts are not enough. Earlier this month, the Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ) sent an open letter to Albanians, which it shared with Fox News Digital. The ECAJ explained that “the character of this country as a free, democratic and multicultural society is at risk,” citing the “fear and anxiety” experienced by Jewish Australians who question whether it is safe to display signs of their Judaism to display or publicly celebrate their faith and heritage.
While the ECAJ was grateful to Albanians for “swiftly condemning” the Melbourne arson, they called on him to act in response to “what is now a national anti-Semitism crisis”. Their requests include an increase in security funding, support for anti-Semitism education in schools, enforcement of laws against harassment and intimidation, and support for increased government efforts to curb violence. anti-Semitism on universities.
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese makes his way through a crowd after visiting the Adass Israel Synagogue in Melbourne, Australia, Tuesday, December 10, 2024. (Joel Carrett/AAP Image via AP)
Albanese’s office did not respond to Fox News Digital’s request for comment on the criticism of the Prime Minister’s response to the Melbourne firebombings, his response to the ECAJ letter and whether the country’s shift on a Palestinian state could have consequences for the state of anti-Semitic hatred. in Australia.
As is the case globally, anti-Semitism in Australia has risen dramatically since October 7, according to a November 2024 ECAJ report. Reporting entities counted 2,062 anti-Semitic incidents in Australia between October 1, 2023 and September 30, 2024, compared to 495 incidents during the previous 12 months. This represents a 316% increase in expressions of anti-Jewish hatred, which began as early as October 8, when the ECAJ reported that Sheikh Ibrahim Daoud told an audience in western Sydney that he was “delighted”, explaining: It’s a day of pride, it’s a day of victory.”
The ECAJ sent Fox News Digital a trove of photos of acts of hate directed at Jewish Australians. These include an incident from November 2023, when unknown persons spotted “Kill Jews” and “Jew lives here” on a housing unit in Melbourne’s southeast and wrote “Jew-free zone” in a window in Brunswick, as reported by the Jewish Independent.
Protesters gather in Melbourne on December 1, 2024 to demand justice for Palestinian victims of violence. (Ye Myo Khant/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images)
The government responded to some major acts of anti-Semitism. In February anti-Israel activists a document released containing the “names and other personal information” of 600 Jewish musicians, writers, academics and artists in a WhatsApp group whose communications were also leaked.
Seven months later, Attorney General Mark Dreyfus announced a proposed penalty of up to six years in prison for those who release individuals’ private information to cause harm. The sentence would increase to seven years if a victim was targeted because of their race, religion or sexual orientation, among other reasons.
A cyclist passes the Adass Israel Synagogue in the Melbourne suburb of Ripponlea in the aftermath of the firebomb attack, on December 8, 2024. (Alexander Bogatyrev/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images)
In recognition of rising intolerance in Australia, the Simon Wiesenthal Center issued a travel advisory on December 9, warning Jews to “exercise extreme caution” when visiting the country. As Rabbi Abraham Cooper, the center’s director of global social action, explained, authorities there have failed to “act against ongoing demonisation, intimidation and violence against Jews and Jewish institutions in Australia.”
