Night of mourning for deadliest attack on Jews since Holocaust
One of Melbourne’s top Jewish leaders has slammed the Albanese government, telling a crowd gathered to mourn the October 7 Hamas attacks that the government had “abandoned” Israel.
Victoria
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One of Melbourne’s top Jewish leaders has slammed the Albanese government, telling a crowd of thousands of Jews who gathered to mourn the anniversary of October 7 that the government had “abandoned” the State of Israel.
As the Prime Minister sat just metres away, Zionism Victoria President Yossi Goldfarb ripped into the Albanese government’s foreign policy measures, declaring that it had “weakened our social cohesion”.
“We have seen darkness in Australia,” he said,
“Darkness underpinned by virulent and dangerous anti-Semitism that is in the view of our community – simply out of control, a threat to everything that makes our country unique and great.
“There is a permissiveness that has let anti-Semitism fester. A permissiveness encouraged by weak and ambiguous expositions of our foreign policy that in our community’s view have weakened our social cohesion, leaving us to feel that the State of Israel has been abandoned as a natural ally of the Australian people.”
The crowd of up to 7000, gathered at Moorabbin on Monday night to mourn the deadliest attack against Jews since the Holocaust, erupted in applause as Mr Goldfarb delivered the powerful speech, with Mr Albanese and his colleagues seated in the front row.
Mr Albanese’s presence at the event comes one day after a message was sent through Jewish community WhatsApp chats urging organisers to uninvite him.
Sharon, the daughter of a Holocaust survivor, said Mr Albanese was “not welcome” in Melbourne’s Jewish community.
“The community of Jews that are coming for this significant and tragic anniversary, do not want it compromised for insincere political posturing,” she said.
Politicians from across the political spectrum have turned out to mark the first anniversary of Hamas’s October 7 massacre of more than a thousand people in southern Israel.
Thousands of people attended the lantern-lit procession through Moorabbin, while across town hundreds of pro-Palestine protesters shunned pleas to cancel their protests on the grisly milestone to march from the Shrine of Remembrance to parliament and a law professor proclaimed October 7 a day of “celebration” for Palestinian people in front of a packed Sydney mosque.
The Prime Minister, Premier Jacinta Allan and Opposition Leader John Pesutto were just three of more than a dozen MPs who marched alongside thousands of Melbourne Jews in the biggest gathering the community has held since the terror attack that rocked the world.
Teal MPs Monique Ryan and Zoe Daniel also joined the huge procession.
Former Premier Daniel Andrews, who now serves as a patron to national body Labor Friends of Israel, was also in the crowd.
Prominent Jewish leader Jeremy Leibler said the turn out was “gratifying”.
“It’s well over 5000 people to me, who have come and not just from the Jewish community, but from the broader community, many of our friends and allies and politicians on both sides of politics to come into a solidarity with the Jewish community,” he said.
Family and friends of loved ones murdered and taken hostage told their heartbreaking stories as part of an official commemoration.
About 1200 people, mostly Jews, were murdered when Hamas terrorists ambushed a music festival and several villages – known as kibbutzim – on October 7 last year, dragging another 251 hostages into Gaza.
Today, 101 still remain in captivity.
Organiser of the event, Zionism Victoria President Yossi Goldfarb, said many in the community continue to go “sleepless night after night” praying for the hostages to be returned safely.
“Our hearts are broken today,” he said.
“We grieve for the 1200 souls who perished one year ago. We cherish the sacrifice and mourn the losses of Israel’s soldiers who have courageously fought against manifest evil, and we weep for Israeli civilians murdered by terrorists.”
Premier Jacinta Allan stood side-by-side with Mr Goldfarb, holding a lantern marked with an Israeli flag, as she joined the procession.
More than a dozen state and federal Liberal Party MPs were also among the huge crowd.
Politicians were told they were not allowed to deliver speeches at the sombre event.
In Sydney, law professor Khaled Beydoun told the crowd at Lakemba Mosque that Israel’s response to Hamas’s attack was now undoubtedly a “genocide”.
Originally published as Night of mourning for deadliest attack on Jews since Holocaust
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