About ECAJ

The Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ) is the peak body of the Australian Jewish community, representing and advocating for the community to government, in the community, and around the world.

Infographic: Australian Jewish communal structureThe ECAJ is con­sti­tuted by Aus­trali­a’s state and territory Jewish communal roof bodies to represent and advocate for the Aus­trali­an Jewish community at the national level. Together, we represent over 200 Jewish organ­isa­tions across Australia.

Since our founding in 1944, we have led advocacy efforts for the Aus­trali­an Jewish community.

Some of our early work advocated for the absorp­tion of Jewish refugees into Aus­trali­an society in the wake of the Holocaust as Australia took in the largest per capita intake of Holocaust survivors in the world outside Israel.

Today, we advocate for our community to live safely and freely as Jewish Aus­trali­ans.

We fight against antisemitism wherever we find it, we defend the national rights of the Jewish people, and we strive to keep our community secure, strong, and vibrant.

Day-to-day, the ECAJ works on:

  • Pro­tect­ing our religious freedoms to observe and practise Judaism in Australia.
  • Acquiring gov­ern­ment funding for the Jewish community’s security needs and over­see­ing its alloc­a­tion.
  • Mon­it­or­ing and reporting incidents of antisemitism.
  • Securing com­pens­a­tion for Holocaust survivors.
  • Advoc­at­ing for the national rights of the Jewish people and encour­aging support for Zionism in Australia.
  • Liaising with the Federal gov­ern­ment to stamp out child abuse.
  • Mon­it­or­ing the content of school curricula in teaching about Israel and the Holocaust.
  • Sup­port­ing ini­ti­at­ives to com­mem­or­ate the Shoah; remem­ber­ing our wonderful Jewish ANZACs.
  • Providing support for the smaller Jewish com­munit­ies outside of Sydney and Melbourne.
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The ECAJ is governed by elected office bearers and its day-to-day work is carried out by a team of pro­fes­sion­al staff, led by co-Chief Executive Officers Peter Wertheim and Alex Ryvchin.

Chief executive officers

Peter has been involved with the ECAJ for nearly 30 years and is currently its co-CEO. Peter pre­vi­ously worked as a lawyer for 32 years, during which he acted as honorary solicitor for a number of charities in the Jewish and wider com­munit­ies. Peter was one of the lawyers who acted for the ECAJ in the late 1990’s and early 2000’s in a series of racial vili­fic­a­tion cases in the Federal Court of Australia.

Peter was the elected President of the NSW Jewish Board of Deputies from 1996 to 2000.  In 2003 he was made a member of the Order of Australia for services to the Jewish and wider com­munit­ies and for work in a variety of projects promoting communal harmony and under­stand­ing. From 2004 to 2015 Peter was a Statutory Board Member of the New South Wales Anti Dis­crim­in­a­tion Board, a State gov­ern­ment body. In July 2010, Peter was appointed by the Aus­trali­an Federal Gov­ern­ment as a member of its Aus­trali­an Mul­ti­cul­tur­al Advisory Council and from 2011 to 2013 its successor body, the Aus­trali­an Mul­ti­cul­tur­al Council. He continues to be widely published and quoted in the media on a broad range of policy matters relating to freedom, democracy and social cohesion in Australia.

Alex Ryvchin was born in Kyiv, Ukraine. His family left the Soviet Union as refugees and refuseniks in 1987.

He attended Sydney Boys High School and studied law and politics at the Uni­ver­sity of New South Wales and practised at leading firms in London and Sydney.

He was awarded a pres­ti­gi­ous Israel Research Fel­low­ship to work as a research fellow and staff writer at a Jerusalem-based think-tank before joining the Executive Council of Aus­trali­an Jewry, Aus­trali­a’s premier rep­res­ent­at­ive and advocacy body for the Aus­trali­an Jewish community, in 2013. He was promoted to co-Chief Executive Officer in February 2018, becoming one of the youngest leaders in the Jewish diaspora. He is a member of the Jewish Dip­lo­mat­ic Corps.

His children’s book, A New Day (2020) written during the Coronavir­us pandemic to help families overcome adversity, was an inter­na­tion­al best­seller and rated by PBS as the top book to help kids navigate the pandemic.

He is the author of the crit­ic­ally acclaimed works, The Anti-Israel Agenda – Inside the Political War on the Jewish State (2017) and Zionism – The Concise History (2019). His fourth book, The Seven Deadly Myths: Antisemitism from the Time of Christ to Kanye West (2023) was short­l­is­ted for the 2023 INDIES Book of the Year Award and invest­ig­ates the extraordin­ary con­spir­acy theories behind antisemitism.

His advocacy and writing has seen him recog­nised as Aus­trali­an of the Year for 2024 by The Aus­trali­an newspaper, as one of 25 global Jewish vis­ion­ar­ies by The Jerusalem Post and in the Daily Telegraph’s Power 100 for 2024.

Daniel is the President of the Executive Council of Aus­trali­an Jewry (ECAJ).

He has pre­vi­ously held the roles of Honorary Secretary, Vice-President and Victorian Coun­cil­lor of the ECAJ.

From 2021 to 2023, he served as President of the Jewish Community Council of Victoria, the roof rep­res­ent­at­ive body of the Victorian Jewish community. In 2013 and 2014, together with Nina Bassat AM and Harry Rosenberg, Daniel was a member of Maccabi Australia’s Committee of Review into member pro­tec­tion matters.

Pro­fes­sion­ally, Daniel is a barrister and King’s Counsel, prac­tising in civil and com­mer­cial lit­ig­a­tion. He has pre­vi­ously received the Ron Merkel KC award from the Victorian Bar for his pro bono advice and advocacy in respect of home­less­ness and elder law.

Daniel and his wife have three children who attend Jewish day schools.

Robert is a barrister prac­ti­cing at the NSW bar and was appointed as Senior Counsel in 2000. He has held a number of lead­er­ship positions in the Jewish Community over the last 40 years. In 1988 he was awarded Mem­ber­ship of the Order of Australia for services to the Jewish Community. In 1994 he was awarded the Jewish Community Services: Communal Lead­er­ship Award and Out­stand­ing Jew Award. In January 2020 he was decorated as an ‘Officer of the Order of Australia’ for dis­tin­guished service to the Jewish community through executive roles with edu­ca­tion­al, cultural and social welfare bodies.

On 26 November 2007 he was elected President of the Executive Council of Aus­trali­an Jewry, the elected rep­res­ent­at­ive organ­iz­a­tion of the Aus­trali­an Jewish community. On 26 January 2009 he was elected as a Vice President and member of the Executive Committee of the World Jewish Congress.

In addition he is currently active as Hon. Life Member of NSW Jewish Board of Deputies (since 1986) and Life Patron and Trustee of Moriah College (since 1999).

Anton has been involved in Jewish community work for over 27 years, including as part of B’nai B’rith Young Adults, as a co-convener and president of B’nai Mitzvot, on the board of man­age­ment of the North Eastern Jewish War Memorial Centre Inc., as chair­per­son of the B’nai Brith Anti-Defam­a­tion Com­mis­sion, as president of the St. Kilda Hebrew Con­greg­a­tion, and as an active member and conductor of his synagogue choirs.

In 1998, Anton joined the executive of the JCCV, and became president in 2005. During this time, he served as a Victorian Coun­cil­lor on the ECAJ. In 2015, Anton was re-elected by the JCCV as a Victorian ECAJ Coun­cil­lor, and in 2016, Anton was elected as the 19th president of the ECAJ.

When not working for the community, Anton is a partner at KCL Law (formerly Kliger Partners).

Peter is a Company Chairman and Director with many decades of exper­i­ence in a range of com­mer­cial enter­prises. He has served the Aus­tralasi­an Jewish community in a number of lead­er­ship positions over many years. He was pre­vi­ously active in a variety of organ­isa­tions in New Zealand, including the NZ Zionist Fed­er­a­tion and the NZ Jewish Council, which he chaired for a four-year term. He variously served first as Appeal Chairman and then President of the NSW Jewish Communal Appeal during the 1990’s and 2000’s. He is an Honorary Life Governor of JCA and a current trustee. He is currently the Chairman of the NSW Council for Jewish Community Security which has oversight over all communal security matters. This is Peter’s third term as ECAJ Honorary Treasurer, having pre­vi­ously served between 2007 – 2010 and 2013 – 2016. He has been a director of the ECAJ Harm Pre­ven­tion Fund since 2010.

 Jillian has held executive and non-executive positions in a variety of Aus­trali­an cor­por­a­tions and across the financial sector. She is a Fellow of the Institute of Company Directors, Member of the Harvard Club of Australia, Member of Chief Executive Women and Founding Co-Chair, Women­Cor­por­ate­Dir­ect­ors (Aus­trali­an Chapter). She is also a member of the Council of the Order of Australia.

After com­plet­ing her Masters at Harvard Law School and working in a New York law firm, Jillian returned to Sydney to become a Senior Associate and later a partner at Allen, Allen and Hemsley in the corporate and envir­on­ment fields.

She then went on to become a Com­mis­sion­er and later Deputy Chair of the Aus­trali­an Secur­it­ies and Invest­ments Com­mis­sion. After com­ple­tion of her five year term she was a review member of the Dawson Review into the Trade Practices Act. In 2003 she set out to pursue a non-executive career and has held a range of corporate and gov­ern­ment advisory board positions since then.

She was appointed the Special Envoy to Combat Antisemitism in Australia in July 2024.

Since her appoint­ment, Jillian has stepped aside from all duties as Immediate Past President of the ECAJ and has not played any part in any decision-making of the ECAJ.

President Daniel Aghion KC (VIC)

Deputy President
Robert M Goot AO SC (NSW)

Co-Chief Executive Officers

  • Peter Wertheim AM
  • Alex Ryvchin

Vice-Pres­id­ents

  • Philip Zajac (VIC)
  • David Ossip (NSW)
  • Dr Michael Levitt AM (WA)
  • Jason Steinberg (QLD)
  • Annetay Henderson-Sapir (SA)
  • Peter Kirby (TAS)
  • Athol Morris (ACT)
  • Vida Goodvach (NT)

Immediate Past President

Jillian Segal AO (NSW)

Honorary Secretary

Anton Block AM (VIC)

Honorary Treasurer

Peter Wise AM (NSW)

Honorary Life Members

  • Nina Bassat AM (VIC)
  • Josie Lacey OAM (NSW)
  • Grahame Leonard AM (VIC)
  • Rabbi Dr John Levi AM DD (VIC)
  • Sam Salcman (VIC)
  • Diane Shteinman AM (NSW)
Alex Masel1945 – 1946
Saul Symonds1946 – 1948
Maurice Ashkenasy CMG QC1948 – 1950, 1954 – 1956, 1958 – 1960, 1962 – 1964, 1966 – 1968
Horace Newman1949 – 1950
Ben Green1950 – 1952
Hon Syd Einfeld AO1952 – 1954, 1956 – 1958, 1960 – 1962, 1964 – 1966
Gerald Falk OBE JP1968 – 1970
Nathan Jacobson OBE1970 – 1972, 1974 – 1976
Louis Klein CBE1972 – 1974
Joachim Schnee­weiss AM1976 – 1978, 1980 – 1982
Leslie Caplan AM1985 – 1987, 1989 – 1992
Isi Leibler AO CBE1978 – 1980, 1982 – 1985, 1987 – 1989, 1992 – 1995
Diane Shteinman AM1996 – 1998
Nina Bassat AM1998 – 2001
Jeremy Jones AM2001 – 2004
Grahame Leonard AM2004 – 2007
Danny Lamm2010 – 2013
Robert Goot AM SC2007 – 2010, 2013 – 2016
Anton Block2016 – 2019
Jillian Segal AO2019 – 2023

Infographic: Australian Jewish communal structure

View and download our infograph­ic of the Aus­trali­an Jewish communal structure on a page, listing ECAJ con­stitu­ents, affil­i­ates, and observers.

Constituents

The ECAJ is con­sti­tuted by the peak state and territory bodies:

These bodies and their affil­i­ates number over 200 Jewish organ­isa­tions across Australia.

Affiliates

A number of national Jewish organ­isa­tions are formally affil­i­ated with the ECAJ:

Observers

Several Jewish organ­isa­tions are formal observers:

Constitution

View con­sti­tu­tion

Ethnic community partnerships

The ECAJ is a partner in:

Government partnerships

The ECAJ formally rep­res­ents the Jewish community in the following gov­ern­ment forums:

  • Human Rights con­sulta­tions hosted by the Depart­ment of Foreign Affairs and the Depart­ment of the Attorney-General.

International partnerships

The ECAJ rep­res­ents the Aus­trali­an Jewish community in inter­na­tion­al forums, including:

See also

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