University campuses across Australia are now back in full swing for 2024. Students attended their orientation week and are now immersed in their studies for first semester. Sounds rather normal, doesn’t it? Sadly, it has been anything but a normal experience for Jewish tertiary students over the past month as they arrived on campus.
I have received phone calls and emails from numerous parents of Jewish tertiary students arriving here in Melbourne, sharing harrowing accounts of how unsafe and frightened their children felt when arriving at their respective campuses to start the year. This was particularly prevalent for those students who are more observantly Jewish. For example, Jewish males wearing skull caps and other religious attire. These students depart the turmoil on campus to head home, feeling traumatised and not wanting to return after instances of being spat on, yelled at, and cornered for being “Zionist Pigs” and “Jewish Colonialist Murderers”.
Antisemitism within universities is nothing new. This is an unfortunate phenomenon dating back to the Middle Ages. During medieval times, Jews were rarely admitted to universities and faced a hostile environment when they were, as many anti-Judaism writings of the time were authored by university faculties. According to Journals recorded within the period, in 1434, the Roman Catholic church placed a ban on conferring any university degree upon Jews.
Centuries later, in 1933, Nazi Germany passed laws barring Jews from holding any official positions, including teaching at universities. According to a Journal of Atomic Scientists at the time, with “virtually no audible protest being raised by their colleagues, thousands of Jewish scientists were suddenly forced to give up their university positions and their names were removed from the rolls of institutions where they were employed.” We all know what followed in the coming years to the Jews of Europe.
Fast forward to 2024. Working as a practicing therapist in private practice, I have seen first-hand how instances of prolonged trauma and abuse of this nature can result in these Jewish tertiary students feeling isolated, depressed, and afraid to leave their homes. Sadly, this has been worsening at Australian universities since the barbaric acts of Hamas on October 7th last year towards Israeli citizens, resulting in the Israeli ground assault into Gaza. Jewish students here are being targeted as scapegoats and focal points for antisemitic abuse as a result. This is confounded by the broader antisemitic actions being undertaken, including the blockage of Jewish owned business from operating and targeting the homes of prominent Jewish families for protests and confrontation.
Such experiences have the potential to create long-term mental health issues for impacted individuals. This can result in difficulty forming healthy adult relationships due to trust issues and low self-esteem. Through dedicated counselling, mental health can be repaired and rebalanced. However, with the potential onset of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) like symptoms, the risk of losing intellectual horsepower and passionate communal involvement due to fear and abandonment, is real.
The majority of university leadership in Australia has conveniently supported and legitimised the scary rise in pro-Palestinian sentiment, protests, and activities at campuses across the country. An outlier amongst the sea of complicity has been Deakin University. In a balanced and pragmatic statement released on October 10th last year, they said that “Deakin University is horrified by the attacks on Israel by Hamas which have caused profound destruction, loss of life and left so many civilians injured. We can only imagine the suffering as a result of these events and express our heartfelt concern for the devastating impact on all those civilians, both Israeli and Palestinian, impacted by the destruction and ongoing violence in Israel and the Gaza Strip.”
As a proud Jewish Australian descendant of holocaust survivors, I seek guidance, comfort, encouragement, and support from our democratically elected leaders during such a difficult time for our community. What does the Labor Federal Minister for Education Jason Clare have to say about this? Saying very little tells us everything we need to know about his desire to protect Australian Jewish students within the university system in 2024. Doesn’t every Australian student have the right to feel safe when walking onto campus, regardless of their religious affiliation?
It’s not in Clare’s best interests to speak out against this blatant antisemitism at our universities. Doing this will result in a backlash in his seat of Blaxland at the next federal election that Clare would have no appetite for whatsoever. I find it interesting to note that in Clare’s electorate of Blaxland, approximately one in four residents identify as Muslim.
Could this be one reason why Clare has remained voluntarily muzzled when it comes to speaking out against the tirade of horrific antisemitic abuse being spat out across Australian Universities at present? Electoral carnage would clearly follow. Clare does not want this to occur.
The best Clare could offer the Jewish community was a rigid, lukewarm statement, saying that “we’ve got to lower the temperature. We’ve got to work together here – that means Labor and Liberal. That means community leaders on both sides.” Hardly what one could call staunch support or resultant reason for calm. As the song goes, “you say it best, when you say nothing at all.” Shadow Minister for Education Sarah Henderson should be commended for calling out the current scenario for what it is. Henderson is on record (late last year) stating that “a recent Australian Jewish University Experience Survey found that 64 per cent of Jewish students have experienced at least one incident of antisemitism during their time at university, 88 per cent of those students are experiencing antisemitism in the past 12 months. According to the survey, more than half of Jewish students have hidden their identity on campus to avoid antisemitism, with many students avoiding campus altogether.”
NSW Liberal Senator Dave Sharma hits the nail on the head. Sharma says that guidelines from the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) should extend to government backed organisations to stamp out rampant antisemitism. The IHRA definition is as follows:
“Antisemitism is a certain perception of Jews, which may be expressed as hatred toward Jews. Rhetorical and physical manifestations of antisemitism are directed toward Jewish or non-Jewish individuals and/or their property, toward Jewish community institutions and religious facilities.”
Based on the IHRA definition of antisemitism and Sharma’s timely call out, as publicly funded institutions Australian universities are clearly breaching these guidelines and should be profoundly challenged on this basis as a starting point.
Worth noting is that Australia adopted and endorsed the IHRA definition of antisemitism on October 21st, 2001. We are one of 43 countries around the world to have done so. This means that the Australian government has a moral and ethical obligation to do whatever it takes to embody the true essence of this definition and support the Jewish community in line with this commitment. Given Prime Minister Anthony Albanese is one of the founding members of the Parliamentary Friends of Palestine, I won’t be holding my breath for this to occur any time soon.
In stark contrast, Liberal Federal Opposition Leader Peter Dutton has been unequivocally supportive of the Jewish community and called out university campuses for what he calls “hotbeds” of antisemitic behaviour. In an interview on Sky News Australia late last year, Dutton stated that “there should be a radical shakeup of the way in which our kids are being taught. Impressionable young minds, some of whom go on to be teachers, and they are influenced, no doubt, by the rhetoric and the fanaticism.” Clear words of support from a long-time ally of the Jewish community.
Adam Kreuzer is a political commentator, columnist, and writer in Melbourne. Adam holds numerous communal board positions and works as a Registered Therapist in private practice.
