Every year on January 26, Australia marks Australia Day, commemorating the 1788 landing of the First Fleet and raising of the Union Flag of Great Britain by Arthur Phillip at Sydney Cove (while also encouraging reflection on past wrongs including towards Indigenous Australians).
In other words, a celebration of the Australia as we know it…or at least as we once knew it.
The Australia I remember (and left almost 25 years ago) seems gone, replaced with an Australia that has witnessed a disturbing rise in antisemitism since October 7, 2023.
Which makes The Australian newspaper’s decision to award their Australians of the Year awards to three brave Australian Jews fighting this scourge of antisemitism timely and brave.
None of them thought they would ever have to fight this fight in Australia. Not in our lucky country, land of opportunity and easygoing mores, where old-world prejudices and enmities were to be left where they belonged: far, far away.
But the fallout of the October 7, 2023 strike on Israel destroyed that notion for this nation’s Jewish community. Outrage at the paroxysm of murder, rape and abduction unleashed by Hamas 15 months ago soon gave way to something else – something hateful that Jews in Australia had never experienced.
A wave of anti-Semitic attacks on their homes, synagogues and schools. The doxxing of Jewish creatives, violating their privacy and personal security, exposing them to threats of the vilest kind.
The harassment of Jewish students and academics on campuses nationwide.
And at every turn, bewilderment in Australia’s deeply patriotic, 116,000-strong Jewish community that the country they loved seemed to have abandoned them. The hate-inspired attacks represent more than a threat to social cohesion, public safety and the rule of law. They also challenge the very essence of what it is to be Australian, warns Josh Frydenberg, this masthead’s joint 2024 Australian of the Year.
“For me, this is about much more than the Jewish community and their safety,” he said. “I believe this is Australia’s fight. We are defending Australian values.”
Together with singer-songwriter Deborah Conway and Jewish leader and author Alex Ryvchin, the former federal treasurer has been recognised for calling out the anti-Semitism that surged here after Israel hit back at Hamas and launched its bloody invasion of Gaza 15 months ago.
Congratulating them, editor-in-chief Michelle Gunn said: “The conflict in the Middle East has changed Australia in a way few of us ever thought possible, with the Jewish community targeted and made to feel unsafe in their own country.
“This surge in anti-Semitism is an assault on the values that our nation, and this newspaper, hold dear. It demanded a strong, unequivocal response. Alex, Deborah and Josh were among those who bravely took a stand.”
In calling out this scourge, our Australians of the Year also stood on the shoulders of others who refused to be cowed into silence. The Australian’s groundbreaking coverage of the attacks is studded with their names: Lachlan and Sarah Murdoch, former Business Council of Australia boss Jennifer Westacott, business leaders Steven and Frank Lowy, NSW Premier Chris Minns, Liberal MP Julian Leeser, Indigenous former senator and Olympic gold medallist Nova Peris, former editor of The Age Michael Gawenda.
Read the whole thing. And watch this:
As a sad reminder of the very antisemitism being fought against by these individuals and many others, The Australian has felt the need to close comments on the social media posts announcing the award winners:
Because they know the amount of hate and vitriol they would have received had they not done so.
But it bears mentioning: this hate and vitriol mostly comes from bad actors within Australia who are immigrants or children of immigrants who benefited from Australia’s hospitality, yet are now biting the hand that feeds them. True, they have their fare share of “White” Australian useful idiots supporting them, but there is little doubt in my mind the chief instigators are Middle Eastern.
Also bears mentioning: these same people don’t celebrate Australia Day. They call it Invasion Day and seek Australia’s destruction just like they seek Israel’s:
