Sonny Bill Williams’ social media post on Gaza hospital sees Jewish leader offer to meet and discuss
Former All Black and NRL star Sonny Bill Williams has been offered a meeting with Jewish leaders to “discuss perspectives” after he shared a graphic video from the Gaza Strip and took aim at israel.
NSW
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Former rugby league star Sonny Bill Williams has been accused by the Israel lobby of “inciting hatred” after sharing a video purported to be from a Gaza hospital on social media while describing supporters of Israel as “Zionist cowards”.
Williams shared the gruesome video clip, described as the bombing of ambulances at Al-Shifa hospital in Gaza, to his 950,000 followers on X with a caption calling on “so called men” to “stand up and fight for our voiceless”.
“Wallahi (I swear to God) where is our Ummah (Muslim community)?” the footballer-turned-boxer wrote.
“All you Zionist cowards wouldn’t last a day fighting real men face to face.”
Williams has been outspoken in his support for Palestine in recent years, and since the latest escalation in the conflict has been frequently posting on social media about Israel’s “war crimes”.
Jewish leaders have condemned Williams’ recent comments, with Executive Council of Australian Jewry co-CEO Alex Ryvchin describing the sports star’s posts as “uninformed”.
Mr Ryvchin has also offered to meet Sonny Bill to discuss the meaning of Zionism.
“His comments are reckless, dangerous and clearly uninformed,” Mr Ryvchin said.
“But to his many fans and followers, they will sound compelling and will serve to incitement hatred and further destabilise our fragile social cohesion.
“I’m sure Sonny Bill doesn’t want to do this and I would be willing to meet with him to discuss our perspectives and build bridges rather than making enemies.”
It comes as in a separate incident, posters depicting Adolf Hitler removing a mask of Benjamin Netanyahu’s face were put up across Sydney’s east over the weekend, prompting outrage from Jewish community leaders.
The posters, seen plastered across parts of Southern Cross Drive and Syd Einfeld Drive at Bondi Junction on Sunday morning, showed the German dictator holding a cutout of the Israeli Prime Minister’s face over half of his own.
Mr Ryvchin slammed the posters as “grotesque” and claimed Nazi comparisons were “inevitable” following recent pro-Palestine rallies held in Sydney’s CBD.
“It is intended to intimidate and harass Jewish Australians, many of whom are Holocaust survivors or their descendants,” Mr Ryvchin said.
“But if these thugs and cretins want to know who resembles Hitler in the context of the war with Hamas, they should look to the savages who went house to house hunting Jews with sadistic pride, raping, torturing and burning alive.”
NSW Jewish Board of Deputies president David Ossip claimed those behind the posters had placed them in suburbs with large numbers of Jewish residents to “inflict maximum trauma”.
“The individuals who put up these sinister posters knew exactly what they were doing … it is devastating to know that Holocaust survivors and their descendants would have this morning confronted prominent images of Hitler as they undertook their normal activities,” Mr Ossip said.
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