ECAJ letter to the Prime Minister calling for six immediate responses to the national antisemitism crisis.

The ECAJ wrote to Prime Minister Anthony Albanese following the terrorist attack on the Adass Israel Synagogue in Melbourne on Friday, calling on him to imme­di­ately adopt, and to strongly encourage state gov­ern­ments to adopt, the following six responses:

1. Provide emergency security funding to meet the Jewish community’s addi­tion­al security needs.
2. Support mandatory national antisemitism education in Aus­trali­an schools.
3. Direct police to strictly enforce existing laws pro­hib­it­ing har­ass­ment or intim­id­a­tion by pro­test­ers of persons attending schools, places of public worship or other communal places, or in jur­is­dic­tions where no such laws currently exist, to enact and strictly enforce laws to that effect.
4. Urgently convene a meeting of National Cabinet to further address the national antisemitism crisis including through uniform policing guidelines, law reform and public campaigns.
5. Enact new legis­la­tion to require Uni­ver­sit­ies to protect the safety and security of students and staff as an over-riding priority.
6. Review the government’s rhetoric and public state­ments on antisemitism and the Israeli-Palestini­an conflict, recog­nising the far greater impact that such state­ments have on local com­munit­ies, than on conflict res­ol­u­tion in the Middle-East.

Download full letter

• ECAJ letter to PM re antisemitism crisis – 8 December 2024 [PDF: 254KB]

Pictured at top: ECAJ President Daniel Aghion KC and Prime Minister Anthony Albanese inside the burnt out Adass Israel Synagogue in Melbourne on 10 December 2024.