{"id":660272,"date":"2026-05-09T18:05:14","date_gmt":"2026-05-09T18:05:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/660272\/"},"modified":"2026-05-09T18:05:14","modified_gmt":"2026-05-09T18:05:14","slug":"australias-antisemitism-inquiry-should-alarm-every-jew","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/660272\/","title":{"rendered":"Australia\u2019s antisemitism inquiry should alarm every Jew"},"content":{"rendered":"

There are moments in a parent\u2019s life when pride and pain arrive together, indistinguishable.<\/p>\n

I experienced that moment recently while reading a formal submission to an Australian Royal Commission. It was not written by a distant public figure or an anonymous witness. It was written by my son, Rabbi Dan Lieberman, Chief Rabbi of the Perth Hebrew Congregation.<\/p>\n

A Royal Commission is not a panel discussion. It is not a symbolic gesture. It is the most serious instrument a democracy possesses when it believes something has gone fundamentally wrong.<\/p>\n

In countries like Australia and the United Kingdom<\/a>, Royal Commissions are rare. They are convened when ordinary systems fail, when a problem is no longer isolated, no longer containable, and no longer ignorable. They carry legal force: the power to compel testimony, to subpoena evidence, to expose systemic breakdown.<\/p>\n

Societies do not reach for a Royal Commission unless they believe they must.<\/p>\n

\"AA member of the forensic team works at the scene, after a man was arrested following a stabbing incident in the Golders Green area, which is home to a large Jewish population, in London, Britain, April 29, 2026. (credit: REUTERS\/HANNAH MCKAY)<\/p>\n

Which is why this moment matters.<\/p>\n

Because when antisemitism<\/a> becomes the subject of a Royal Commission, two truths are being acknowledged, whether explicitly or not.<\/p>\n

The first is that this is no longer a collection of unfortunate incidents.<\/p>\n

It is something deeper, more entrenched, a structural problem serious enough to demand national scrutiny.<\/p>\n

The second is even more striking: it is recognised as such.<\/p>\n

Not dismissed. Not minimised. Not explained away. But recognised.<\/p>\n

And yet, there is a dissonance here that should trouble us.<\/p>\n

If antisemitism is serious enough to warrant a Royal Commission, serious enough to trigger the most powerful investigative machinery of the state, then how is it that, on the ground, so many of the experiences described still feel ignored, downplayed, or inadequately addressed?<\/p>\n

How can something be both officially acknowledged as a national concern and yet, in daily life, treated as marginal?<\/p>\n

That gap, between recognition and response, is where trust begins to fracture.<\/p>\n

And it is precisely that gap that my son\u2019s submission exposes.<\/p>\n

‘Deeply concerning pattern of antisemitism’<\/p>\n

He writes with restraint, almost deliberately so: \u201cThis submission\u2026 reflects not isolated incidents, but what I believe to be a broader and deeply concerning pattern of antisemitism.\u201d<\/p>\n

Not isolated, but a systemic pattern.<\/p>\n

Dan did not arrive in Australia by accident. He came seeking safety after leaving the United Kingdom following an antisemitic attack in which \u201can incendiary device was placed underneath my car.\u201d For a time, Australia seemed to offer what Britain no longer could, a tolerant, pluralistic society.
But then came the shift.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn May 2021,\u201d he writes, \u201cI was verbally abused, threatened, and physically pursued\u2026 who accused me of killing children in Gaza.\u201d A sentence that captures something now painfully familiar: distant conflicts imported into local streets, with Jews made collectively responsible.<\/p>\n

After October 7<\/a>, the change accelerated.<\/p>\n

He describes his experience as a University Chaplain. On campuses, Jewish students found their concerns \u201cfrequently minimised or not substantively addressed.\u201d In schools, there was \u201cverbal abuse, intimidation, and social exclusion.\u201d<\/p>\n

And then, the line that no parent or grandparent should ever have to read.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy sons, then aged 12 and 14, were subjected to explicit antisemitic abuse by a passing motorist.\u201d<\/p>\n

The offender was caught. He pleaded guilty.<\/p>\n

But justice does not erase what follows.<\/p>\n

\u201cOne of my sons remarked that it is impossible to be openly Jewish in Australia.\u201d<\/p>\n

That sentence should not be allowed to pass quietly.<\/p>\n

Not because it is dramatic, but because it is spoken by a child. A child is already learning that identity carries risk. A child is already calculating visibility.<\/p>\n

The next day, at a football match, two players responded to his gesture of sportsmanship with just two words: \u201cHeil Hitler.\u201d<\/p>\n

And still, the submission remains measured, controlled, and almost understated.<\/p>\n

\u201cI now find myself engaging in heightened vigilance,\u201d he writes, describing anxiety, disrupted sleep, and fears for his community.<\/p>\n

This is not how Jewish life in the Diaspora<\/a> is meant to feel in the 21st century.<\/p>\n

But perhaps the most telling line is not about hostility, but about absence.<\/p>\n

\u201cSince October 7, I have not received messages of solidarity\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

No outrage. No reassurance. No reaching out.<\/p>\n

This is where the issue deepens.<\/p>\n

Because a Jewish Diaspora community can endure hostility. It has done so for centuries.<\/p>\n

What is far harder to endure is indifference.<\/p>\n

And here lies the uncomfortable truth.<\/p>\n

If a society must convene a Royal Commission to investigate antisemitism, it is acknowledging that something is deeply wrong. But if, at the same time, those living through it feel unheard, unprotected, or alone, then recognition without response becomes its own kind of failure.<\/p>\n

This is not only an Australian story. It is a Diaspora story.<\/p>\n

Across Europe, North America, and beyond, Jews are asking similar questions. Can we live openly? Can our children be visible? Can identity exist without fear?<\/p>\n

And increasingly, the answers are uncertain.<\/p>\n

But this is not a call to retreat. I am not beating the drum for aliyah as an escape (although it is one option).<\/p>\n

If anything, it is a call to clarity and to defiance.<\/p>\n

Because there is something profoundly powerful in the act of testimony. In speaking. In documenting. In refusing to allow these experiences to disappear into the background noise of public life.<\/p>\n

A Royal Commission exists because a society believes it can confront its failures and correct them.<\/p>\n

My son\u2019s submission is not simply a record of what has happened. It is a demand that Australia live up to its own ideals.<\/p>\n

And it is a warning to the rest of us.<\/p>\n

The Jewish future has never depended solely on the goodwill of others. It has depended on an insistence, quiet, but unyielding, that we will live as Jews, openly and without apology.<\/p>\n

If a child can say, \u201cIt is impossible to be openly Jewish,\u201d then the response cannot be to become less visible.<\/p>\n

It must be to ensure that such a sentence becomes unthinkable.<\/p>\n

One of my other sons recently remarked with brutal clarity that \u201cEurope cannot be trusted to house Jews\u201d.<\/p>\n

The question is not whether Jews will endure. We always have and we always will.<\/p>\n

The question is whether the societies in which we live will prove themselves worthy of that endurance.<\/p>\n

The writer is a rabbi and physician. He writes and teaches on Jewish ethics, leadership, and resilience. His work appears on rabbidrjonathanlieberman.substack.com and youtube.com\/@rabbidrjonathanlieberman<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"There are moments in a parent\u2019s life when pride and pain arrive together, indistinguishable. I experienced that moment…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":660273,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[319028,9903,64,63,201506,64267,61162,44,3586,1055],"class_list":["post-660272","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-aliyah","tag-antisemitism","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-bondi-beach-mass-shooting","tag-diaspora","tag-judaism","tag-news","tag-united-kingdom","tag-united-states"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/660272","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=660272"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/660272\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/660273"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=660272"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=660272"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=660272"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}