NSW nurse claims she ‘wrote an open letter’ about alleged anti-Semitism after October 7 attacks
A NSW Health nurse has said pregant Jewish women are afraid after a video surfaced of Sydney nurses allegedly making threats against Israeli patients.
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A midwife has said pregnant Jewish women and Jewish healthcare workers are afraid to speak out about what she claims is rife antisemitism in the Australian healthcare system.
Sharon Stoliar made the comments speaking to Sharri Markson on Sky News on Thursday night, after the suspension of two Bankstown Hospital nurses accused of making threats against Israeli patients.
The NSW Health nurse claimed she previously raised concerns about anti-Semitic rhetoric among healthcare staff, only to find herself under investigation instead.
“I raised the alarm about this not long after October 7th happened,” Sharon Stoliar posted to Instagram.
“When nurses and midwives were chanting ‘from the river to the sea’ while wearing NSW Health uniforms, I wrote an open letter explaining that this chant is a call for the annihilation of Jews, and that they should not be shouting this genocidal chant, let alone while wearing NSW Health uniforms.”
Her concerns were taken to the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency (AHPRA), but instead of action against those making the chants, she found herself facing complaints.
“AHPRA and the Health Care Complaints Commission (HCCC) received eight complaints about me, mostly about that post I wrote, some asking for me to be deregistered,” she said.
“While initially dismissed, two anonymous complainants requested a review, leading to the HCCC placing formal ‘corrective comments’ on my registration—without my knowledge or my legal right to reply.”
She said that when she shared her experience on social media, she received a warning letter mentioning potential legal consequences.
It was only after obtaining legal assistance that she was able to have the corrective comments removed and receive an apology from the HCCC.
“See what happened here? Do you see the double standards?” she asked.
She contrasted her experience with that of the two Bankstown nurses, who were filmed making antisemitic comments and claiming they had refused treatment to Israeli patients.
“I asked for the end of a genocidal chant by NSW Health staff wearing uniforms, and I get formal corrective comments and threats of jail time,” she said.
“Then NSW Health nurses actually make genocidal threats, in black and white, and claim they have already started the process…”
She is now calling for stronger action against the suspended nurses.
“These two nurses need to be criminally charged for threatening to murder patients, and they should be deregistered, not just removed from NSW Health.”
On Thursday night she said antisemitism “had been left to fester” in the Australian healthcare system.
“We’ve seen the tip of the iceberg … Jewish healthcare workers, Jewish pregnant women are afraid to speak out,” she told Sky News host Sharri Markson.
“This is a cancer in our healthcare system … this has been allowed to fester and brew because there has been no leadership from regulatory bodies in healthcare.
“I think if nothing is done now it will only get worse.”
‘Critical’ footage to be handed over
Police say the full video of the two nurses filmed in a sickening anti-Semitic rant will be “critical” in laying charges.
The two nurses are yet to present themselves to investigators for questioning, instead hiring lawyers to negotiate on their behalf.
After the emergence of the horrifying video on Wednesday, detectives swiftly began investigating the Bankstown Hospital employees, but The Australian has revealed the pair are yet to speak with police.
Instead, they have each hired lawyers who are now “negotiating” with detectives about when and how they will be questioned.
Content creator Max Veifer, who first uploaded the video, spoke with police and has agreed to hand over a full and unedited version of the video conversation, which he recorded on Tuesday night.
He will also give a formal statement, NSW Police Commissioner Karen Webb said.
Ms Webb told ABC Radio Sydney what she had seen so far appeared to constitute “a hate crime”.
Detectives working under Strike Force Pearl, established to probe a string of escalating anti-Semitic attacks across Sydney, have also seized CCTV footage from Bankstown Hospital and spoken to Mr Nadir and Ms Abu Lebdeh’s colleagues.
Union slammed for ‘shameful’ statement
A powerful union has been slammed for a “shameful” statement it issued in response to the video.
On Wednesday, the Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation distributed a media release after the shocking vision emerged of Ahmad “Rashad” Nadir and Sarah Abu Lebdeh’s rant.
The two nurses, who have been stood down from duties at Bankstown Hospital in Sydney’s west, are now facing a police probe over their chilling remarks to Israeli content creator Max Veifer on a video chat site.
The union, which says it’s the largest in the country, began its statement by saying it “condemns all forms of racism, bigotry and hatred, including acts of anti-Semitism and Islamophobia”.
That reference to Islamophobia in specific response to the video angered the Australian Jewish Association, which said the ANMF is “part of the problem”.
“Since 7 October 2023, we have seen leftist nursing organisations do NOTHING about the anti-Israel activism and anti-Semitism in their midst,” the group said in a post on X.
“Jewish hospital staff and patients have been harassed as a result of your complicity.”
It went on to call the union “a shameful disgrace”.
The AJA’s chief executive Robert Gregory was even more scathing in an interview with the Daily Mail, slamming the “woke habit of needing to refer to every kind of discrimination instead of just condemning anti-Semitism”.
“There is no major issue of ’Islamophobia’ in Australia’s healthcare system and in fact the nurses who threatened Jewish patients are both Muslim,” Mr Gregory told the outlet.
Dutton raises citizenship question
Peter Dutton has called for a national discussion about the “inadequacies of the migration system” that granted citizenship to one of the nurses caught in a vile anti-Israel tirade.
The opposition leader unloaded on Mr Nadir and Ms Abu Lebdeh in an interview on 2GB radio this morning.
Mr Dutton said it was a “deep concern” that Mr Nadir, who he said “hates our country”, could “get through the net” and be granted citizenship.
“It’s an outrage and we’ve got big problems in this country when somebody like that can become an Australian citizen,” he said.
The nurse came to Australia as a refugee from Afghanistan when he was 12 and was naturalised in 2020. Mr Dutton indicated support for stripping him of that citizenship.
“To take citizenship or strip citizenship from somebody, there are constitutional constraints, and at some stage, our country has to have a discussion, I think, about the way in which the whole migration system works,” Mr Dutton told 2GB.
“I think it’s a conversation for our country at some point, maybe sooner than later, about how we can say to these people, if you don’t share our values, if you’re here and you’re enjoying the welfare system and you’re enjoying free health and free education, then at the same time you hate our country?
“Well, I don’t think you’ve got a place here.”
Anti-Israel nurse led ‘martyrdom’ prayer
One of the nurses under police investigation over a vile anti-Semitic rant filmed inside a Sydney hospital can be seen in a resurfaced clip leading a mosque in a martyrdom prayer.
Video has emerged of Mr Nadir reciting the martyrdom prayer just months before he accepted his Australian citizenship.
His brother uploaded the video to YouTube in 2020, showing the 27-year-old passionately singing an elegy in honour of the martyrdom of Husayn ibn Ali in the fabled Battle of Karbala.
The video was deleted from YouTube yesterday, but a copy was obtained and published today by The Daily Mail.
Move to strip nurses of registration
Moves are underway to strip the two nurses of their accreditation, with the Commonwealth investigating how it can prevent the pair working in any care capacity ever again.
Speaking to reporters today, federal Health Minister Mark Butler said the views of Mr Nadir and Ms Abu Lebdeh were “deeply shocking” and saw his job as being to “protect all Australians, particularly Jewish Australians, against these two people”.
While they have been stood down by NSW Health, Mr Butler said he wanted to ensure authorities “lock these people out of the health system entirely”.
“I’m advised by the NSW Government … that the relevant authority that has responsibility for their registration as nurses has been asked to consider an interim suspension.
“I’m worried that even though they’ve been suspended from NSW Health, I don’t want them working in another private hospital or an aged care facility.”
Each state authority had the power to suspend registrations and Mr Butler said he wants to see that happen “as soon as possible”.
“As soon as that happens [in one state], that applies right through the rest of the country. If the NSW authority suspends their registration as nurses in NSW, they are then unable, for example, to cross the border and try and get a shift at a hospital in Queensland or Victoria.
“I want to see that happen as soon as possible.
“But I’ve also asked my department for advice about how we stop them moving into another part of the system. For example, going into an aged care facility not as a nurse but as a carer.
“I’m doing everything that I can to make sure these two people are not put in touch in a caring sense with any Australian again.”
Pro-Palestine images scrubbed
Bankstown Hospital is in damage control as the Health Minister Ryan Park visited the facility to address staff.
Sky News revealed last night that hospital authorities have deleted multiple images from its social media profiles of staff and visitors wearing pro-Palestine shirts.
It also published a newsletter in mid-2024 about its multicultural efforts, which included a woman donned in a ‘Free Palestine’ top.
Bankstown Hospital employed the two nurses who were filmed in a vile anti-Semitic rant, including claims they would kill Jewish patients who presented at the facility.
NSW Health is now investigating why the woman was featured in the hospital newsletter, Premier Chris Minns has confirmed.
The image has since been deleted from social media.
Sky News reported on Wednesday night that it’s one of multiple pro-Palestine photographs to be scrubbed from official hospital accounts.
In state parliament yesterday, opposition health spokeswoman Kelly Sloane asked the premier if there was a “systemic problem” at Bankstown Hospital.
“I don’t know about this particular political message,” he said of the shirt images. “Of course we will investigate that.
“If any member anywhere has information about that kind of political messaging that could undermine public confidence, we want to know about it,” he said.
A furious Mr Park visited the hospital today to address staff.
“None of this is funny, none of this is a joke, it’s not a joke to the Jewish community, it’s not a joke to the [NSW Health] Secretary Susan Pearce, and it’s not a joke to me and the broader community,” he said.
“What this behaviour shows is that those two people do not understand the role that they play as healthcare workers in NSW Health.”
No evidence patients were harmed
Ahead of a visit to Bankstown Hospital today to address staff, the health minister has insisted there’s no evidence there were “more adverse patient outcomes”.
However, a full investigation will be conducted to ensure the nurses’ treatment of patients wasn’t harmful, Mr Park said.
“There’s no evidence that there are more adverse patient outcomes at this particular hospital than other particular hospitals,” Mr Park said.
“So, there’s nothing to indicate anything at this stage. But I want to be clear — we’ve really only begun that detailed work.”
‘Vile’ clip that triggered national outrage
The furore from the shocking clip continues to mount, sparking global headlines and prompting a long line of political leaders across the spectrum to condemn the remarks.
“I’m so upset that you’re Israeli, like eventually you’re going to get killed,” Mr Nadir said in the vision.
When Mr Veifer asked why he was going to get killed, Ms Abu Lebdeh appeared on the screen.
“It’s Palestine’s country not your country, you piece of s***,” she said. “One day your time will come and you will die the most … listen to me when your time comes, I want you to remember my face so you can understand that you will die the most disgusting death.”
Mr Veifer questioned whether they would treat an Israeli person, but Ms Abu Lebdeh cut him off saying “I won’t treat them, I’ll kill them … Not God forbid, I hope to God”.
In the video Mr Nadir, the other nurse, replied to a question Mr Veifer made about whether an Israeli person would be treated by them.
“You have no idea how many Israeli … dog came to this hospital and … I literally sent them to (the afterlife),” a scrubs-wearing Mr Nadir said, while slicing his hand across his neck.
Ms Abu Lebdeh is believed to have graduated with a diploma of nursing five years ago, and has been working at NSW Health since February 2021.
A man who identified himself as her uncle told The Australian on Wednesday that Ms Abu Lebdeh was “sorry” for her remarks.
“I’m trying to calm her down to see what the f**k happened,” he said outside her home.
Her uncle insisted that she posed no threat to Israeli patients.
“You can’t talk to her now because she’s having a panic attack. We might be calling the ambulance for her.”
‘She was set up’
Another man, who identified himself as Ms Abu Lebdeh’s brother, said the video of his sister had been edited and that she had essentially been pushed into making her horrific comments.
Mohammed Abu Lebdeh told the Daily Mail his sister “helped” rather than “hurt” people.
“That video was a set up. You can see that it’s edited. You can see the jump cuts.
“Sarah said those things but she was pushed. She was baited.”
Mr Abu Lebdeh claimed 70 family members had been lost in Palestine which he claimed she had explained on the video.
“To hear those things. It’s too much, but he cut that part out and made it look like she just said that,” he claimed.
“She was provoked. She snapped. Anyone would.”
Police have acknowledged the video was edited and have asked Mr Veifer for the full version, with no cuts, as part of their investigations into the incident.
‘It was a joke’
Mr Nadir’s lawyer said he had given a “sincere apology” to Mr Veifer and the wider Jewish community.
“He understands what has happened. He is trying to make amends with what has happened. He has never appeared before the court in relation to any criminal matters. He is a person of prior good character,” Mr Sakr said.
“He’s apologised for the action, he’s apologised for his words, whether he had the mental capacity at the time of an alleged offence, to commit an offence, that is a matter for the courts.”
Talking to The Daily Telegraph, Mr Nadir said: “It was a joke, a misunderstanding … I will use social media, anything, to apologise but I need to go and see the detectives first.”
Israeli newspaper says nurses ‘sorry, not sorry?’
The nurses’ comments have made waves around the world, including Israel.
The country’s biggest newspaper Israel Hayom characterised the pair as trying to “play down” the furore, and pushing the line that it was merely a “misunderstanding”.
It asked, in a headline, if the nurses were “sorry, not sorry?”
News website Ynet said the country’s ambassador to Australia Amir Maimon had spoken to NSW Premier Chris Minns and called for Mr Nadir and Ms Abu Lebdeh to be fired.
Israel’s deputy foreign minister Sharren Haskel said anti-Semitism was a “disease spreading in Australia”.
“This behaviour must be dealt with to the fullest extent of the law and at the very least, they should be fired,” Ynet reported her as saying.
“They violated the Hippocratic oath, spoke of murdering Jews and exposed the real racism and hatred that the Jewish community in Australia faces today”.
Originally published as NSW nurse claims she ‘wrote an open letter’ about alleged anti-Semitism after October 7 attacks
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