Anthony Albanese must abandon ‘mild’ approach to anti-Semitism, leading rabbi Benjamin Elton says
Anthony Albanese must abandon his ‘very mild’ approach to tackling anti-Semitism if he wants to protect Australia’s social fabric, one of the nation’s leading rabbis has warned in an extraordinary intervention.
Anthony Albanese must abandon his “very mild” approach to tackling anti-Semitism and more strongly condemn hatred towards Jewish people if he wants to protect Australia’s social fabric, one of the nation’s leading rabbis has warned in an extraordinary intervention.
Benjamin Elton – the decade-long chief minister at Sydney’s Great Synagogue, one of the nation’s oldest Jewish communities – said he could not understand why the Prime Minister had been unable to find the right language to condemn anti-Jewish hate and warned that his failure had not helped to stem anti-Semitism or societal breakdown.
After a week that included an attack on cars and homes targeting Sydney’s Jewish community, and widespread criticism of Labor’s failure to criticise the International Criminal Court’s arrest warrants for democratically elected Israeli leaders, the rabbi’s warnings is an inflection point in Australia’s anti-Semitism crisis.
Rabbi Elton said in an interview with The Australian on Sunday he believed Mr Albanese was a “very sincere person” but whose language and actions had failed to match the severity of escalating anti-Semitism, particularly in comparison with NSW Premier Chris Minns.
“(I refrain) from weighing in on political controversies, or from criticising one leader and praising another … But when there’s moral failings or problems in society, (I’m motivated to) ask difficult questions, and to point to a better way forward,“ he said.
“I’m not saying this (to rebuke) the Prime Minister, who I hold in high regard as a very sincere person, but I’ve been moved to speak because when there is a falling short, religious leaders have to speak up.”
Rabbi Elton – one of several orthodox Jewish leaders Mr Albanese met in May, when he promised to stamp out anti-Semitism – has delivered the strongest critique of Labor’s handling of anti-Semitism from a religious leader since Hamas’s October 7 massacre sparked the war in Gaza.
Mr Albanese called the incident “disturbing” and “deeply troubling”. Rabbi Elton said those comments did not appreciate the disaster facing Australia’s Jewish communities, adding that the time for “understatement” had gone.
“Those are very mild words … I had a member of our congregation in one of the blocks of flats targeted,” Rabbi Elton said.
“A car was torched, there could have easily been deaths. It’s an extraordinary breakdown of Australian civil society … the level of response the Prime Minister believes is currently appropriate, I think we’ve passed that stage.”
Mr Albanese commented upon arrival in Australia after the G20 summit in Brazil, adding that there was “no place” for anti-Semitism and that overseas conflict could not incite domestic prejudice. Mr Minns labelled last week’s attack as “undeniably a hate crime” and vowed to throw “massive resources” into catching the perpetrators of “one of the most ugly scenes” he’d witnessed – a response Rabbi Elton described as “extraordinarily strong”.
“Your hateful violent acts will not be tolerated and the police are hunting you right now,” the Labor Premier said of the “vile individuals” behind it.
The pressure on Mr Albanese to act on anti-Semitism and strengthen support for Israel increased on Sunday ahead of the last sitting week of the year, with the opposition signalling the nation should reconsider its membership of the International Criminal Court over its warrants to arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former defence minister Yoav Gallant.
After calls from former prime ministers Tony Abbott and Scott Morrison for a rethink on ICC membership, opposition legal affairs spokeswoman Michaelia Cash said Australia “had grounds” to reconsider its support for the Rome Statute. “Anthony Albanese, (Foreign Minister) Penny Wong, pick up the phone to Prime Minister Netanyahu and tell him that he is welcome in Australia any time and that we stand with Israel, not with the Hamas terrorists,” Senator Cash added in comments to Sky News.
An Albanese government spokeswoman said the Prime Minister had “unequivocally condemned” last week’s “anti-Semitic act”, adding that the “intimidation” of the community and “violence” were unacceptable. “These actions are aimed at creating fear in the community … it will not be tolerated,” she said.
“These are disturbing scenes and deeply troubling to all Australians. There is no place for anti-Semitism in Australia.”
Writing in The Australian, Rabbi Elton urges Mr Albanese to “exercise” clear leadership that condemns anti-Semitism but goes further to call out the conditions that have allowed it to flourish.
Rabbi Elton praised Mr Minns for being “extraordinarily strong” in the wake of the violence against Jewish people. “He strikes the right message (on anti-Semitism), and that sends a message across the entirety of NSW society,” Rabbi Elton said.
“That same message needs to go through Australian society as a whole … but the (Prime Minister’s) thinking needs to go further, we’re looking at a much deeper breakdown than we’ve confronted so far. He (Mr Albanese) is doing the right thing but without enough force … we’ve gone beyond the stage where a slap on the wrist from the Prime Minister is going to calm things down or bring people into line.”
Australian values, Rabbi Elton said, had been forgotten or left by the wayside. “ … As a society we’ve failed over recent periods in insisting on the values that Australians have to uphold and that we expect of everybody,” he said.
Rabbi Elton said the idea that each community could “do its own thing” with unique values, as long as those didn’t impede on others, was not enough without a shared commitment.
“As we’ve seen, (Australia’s multicultural society) breaks down unless you insist that each community also signs up to (a set of) shared values,” he said.
Late last year, The Great Synagogue was forced to cancel bar mitzvahs, given the proximity of weekly pro-Palestine demonstrations to its CBD doorstep. In July, Jewish leaders criticised activists who targeted it with anti-Israel banners, calling it “intimidatory” and saying it was telling the group had chosen to protest at a synagogue rather than a consulate.
The Great Synagogue president David Lewis lamented Australia’s “sharp rise” in anti-Semitism, revealing that the building had been vandalised, a target of anti-Israel protests, and that some congregation members felt too “afraid” to attend.
Mr Lewis said the state government had “stepped up to the plate” in its response to last week’s incident, revealing that the Premier had addressed the synagogue’s community over the Jewish New Year.
“However, the lack of action we have seen from the federal government has been disappointing,” he said. “ … We have seen this rising tide in anti-Semitism turn once more to vandalism in the Woollahra; an area filled with members of our community, as well as other synagogues and important places of worship.”
NSW Police Strike Force Mylor, established after last week’s attacks, is searching for two masked and hooded figures pictured fleeing from the area. Investigators are also hoping to speak to the driver of a white Holden Captiva seen in the vicinity.
The government’s special envoy for social cohesion, Peter Khalil, told The Weekend Australian that tragedy abroad did not give activists free rein to do anything they wanted in the name of that cause.
Figures covering October 2023 to March this year from the Executive Council of Australian Jewry showed a 427 per cent increase in the number of anti-Jewish incidents compared with the same period the year before.
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