Hatred and intimidation levelled at Australia’s Jewish community must not be tolerated

The Centre for Independent Studies extends our deep sympathies to all those affected by the shocking terrorist attack at Bondi.  The heinous crime should confirm to everyone that the upswell of public hatred and intimidation levelled at Australia’s Jewish community must not be tolerated.

The tragedy confirms the importance of CIS work on democratic values in a free and open society through our Culture, Prosperity and Civil Society program headed by Peter Kurti, in particular through its multi-year antisemitism project.

As Kurti says in an oped in The Wall Street Journal in response to the Bondi shootings: Australia faces a choice familiar to other liberal democracies: whether to confront antisemitism clearly and decisively or to continue managing it as an embarrassment to be explained away. Too often, political leaders have preferred ritual condemnation over moral clarity and bureaucratic language over responsibility.

Last week, we published the first paper from our antisemitism project, Reframing an Ancient Hatred: the intersection of left-wing antisemitism and anti-Zionism by Julie Claridge.

Michael Stutchbury
Executive director
Centre for Independent Studies