Celebrating 80 years as the voice of the Australian Jewish community

Aus­tralian Jews came togeth­er in 1944 to estab­lish a nation­al roof body to advo­cate for the inter­ests of the Aus­tralian Jew­ish com­mu­ni­ty. They did so at a time when the glob­al Jew­ish com­mu­ni­ty faced the most seri­ous exis­ten­tial threat in its mod­ern his­to­ry. 

80 years on the ECAJ con­tin­ues its tire­less advo­ca­cy for the Aus­tralian Jew­ish com­mu­ni­ty: to gov­ern­ment, in the courts, in the media, in the com­mu­ni­ty, and around the world.

We cel­e­brat­ed 80 years as your voice by shar­ing a high­light each day over a fort­night. Over the first week we cel­e­brat­ed our past; over the sec­ond week we shared how we’re shap­ing our future.

You can see our high­lights here on this page or fol­low our updates on Face­book, Insta­gram, or What­sApp for updates.

Celebrating our past

Advocating for Holocaust refugees and the State of Israel

The ECAJ played a cru­cial role in secur­ing fund­ing to sup­port the trans­port, recep­tion, and inte­gra­tion of Holo­caust sur­vivors into Aus­tralia.

Our advo­ca­cy was instru­men­tal in allow­ing Aus­tralia to admit a sig­nif­i­cant num­ber of sur­vivors, mak­ing it one of the lead­ing coun­tries out­side Israel in accept­ing them.

Start­ing in 1945, the ECAJ’s work led to Australia’s first Immi­gra­tion Min­is­ter, Arthur Cal­well, grant­i­ng land­ing per­mits to sur­vivors on a human­i­tar­i­an basis, over­com­ing ini­tial quo­tas.

By 1961, the Jew­ish pop­u­la­tion in Aus­tralia had near­ly tripled from 1933.

Fur­ther­more, Aus­tralia, through Dr. Her­bert Vere Evatt played a sig­nif­i­cant role in the cre­ation of the State of Israel.

Evatt, as Min­is­ter for Exter­nal Affairs and lat­er as Pres­i­dent of the UN Gen­er­al Assem­bly, was instru­men­tal in the Par­ti­tion Plan nego­ti­a­tions and the UN vote on Res­o­lu­tion 181 in Novem­ber 1947.

His inter­ac­tions with the Aus­tralian Jew­ish com­mu­ni­ty and the ECAJ were key to the suc­cess­ful estab­lish­ment of Israel.

Advocating for Soviet Jewry

The Under Isi J. Leibler’s lead­er­ship, the ECAJ shift­ed the World Jew­ish Con­gress’s approach to Sovi­et Jew­ry from qui­et diplo­ma­cy to a pub­lic cam­paign involv­ing direct protests and advo­ca­cy to gov­ern­ments, media, trade unions, and civ­il soci­ety. 

This change was piv­otal in secur­ing free­dom for Sovi­et Jew­ry. 

The ECAJ led a relent­less cam­paign in Aus­tralia for the res­cue of Sovi­et Jews, start­ing with a major ral­ly at Syd­ney Town Hall and achiev­ing sig­nif­i­cant suc­cess­es from the 1970s to the mid-1980s.

Advocating for racial villification laws

The ECAJ played a cru­cial role in advo­cat­ing for racial vil­i­fi­ca­tion laws in Aus­tralia. Our sub­mis­sions were piv­otal in the Aus­tralian Human Rights Com­mis­sion’s reports from 1983 and 1991, which rec­om­mend­ed fed­er­al leg­is­la­tion against racial vil­i­fi­ca­tion and gross racist pro­pa­gan­da. 

Our advo­ca­cy con­tributed to the enact­ment of such a law in 1995.  We have con­tin­ued to push for fur­ther legal mea­sures, includ­ing laws against incite­ment of racist vio­lence, pub­lic dis­play of Nazi sym­bols, and Nazi salutes. 

 

Silencing Holocaust deniers

The ECAJ is unique among Jew­ish orga­ni­za­tions for suc­cess­ful­ly fil­ing for­mal racial vil­i­fi­ca­tion com­plaints with the Aus­tralian Human Rights Com­mis­sion and the courts. 

We have achieved sig­nif­i­cant vic­to­ries in land­mark cas­es, includ­ing one against Holo­caust denier Fredrick Tobin and his “Ade­laide Insti­tute”. 

Addi­tion­al­ly, the ECAJ is the only Jew­ish body rec­og­nized by the courts with the author­i­ty to bring and pros­e­cute these com­plaints on behalf of the Jew­ish com­mu­ni­ty. 

 

Combatting terrorist organisations

In 2021, the ECAJ and oth­er Jew­ish orga­ni­za­tions made exten­sive sub­mis­sions to an inquiry by the Par­lia­men­tary Joint Com­mit­tee on Intel­li­gence and Secu­ri­ty, advo­cat­ing for Hezbol­lah and Hamas to be list­ed in their entire­ty as ter­ror­ist orga­ni­za­tions. 

Pre­vi­ous­ly, only parts of these groups were list­ed. The ECAJ argued that list­ing Hezbol­lah would address the mis­con­cep­tion that its ter­ror­ism could be sep­a­rat­ed from its oth­er activ­i­ties. 

Hezbol­lah was offi­cial­ly ful­ly list­ed under the Crim­i­nal Code on 10 Decem­ber 2021. 

Sim­i­lar­ly, the ECAJ sup­port­ed the full list­ing of Hamas, which was com­plet­ed on 4 March 2022, rec­og­niz­ing it as a sin­gu­lar enti­ty with over­lap­ping oper­a­tions. 

 

Shaping our future

Every day in the last week of our anniver­sary cel­e­bra­tion we will add a new reel about how we’re shap­ing the future of our Jew­ish com­mu­ni­ty. Check back dai­ly or fol­low us on Face­book, Insta­gram, or What­sApp for updates.

The voice of our community in the media

In response to 7 Octo­ber, the ECAJ has once again been the voice of Aus­tralian Jews in our time of need. 

We have advo­cat­ed for our rights, safe­ty and free­doms through­out the coun­try, reach­ing a nation­al audi­ence across every plat­form and net­work. 

We have worked tire­less­ly to speak for our com­mu­ni­ty and our peo­ple with clar­i­ty, strength and focus amid unprece­dent­ed chal­lenges.

Representation to government

The ECAJ is the voice of the Aus­tralian Jew­ish com­mu­ni­ty to gov­ern­ment. 

We have led the calls for law reform and polit­i­cal lead­er­ship to pro­tect our com­mu­ni­ty. 

We have demand­ed the pros­e­cu­tion of those who incite against our com­mu­ni­ty and frac­ture the har­mo­ny of our soci­ety. 

We have also act­ed for the com­mu­ni­ty in bring­ing action under the Racial Dis­crim­i­na­tion Act against hate preach­ers and force­ful­ly advo­cat­ed for anti-doxxing laws in the wake of the shame­ful attacks on Jew­ish Aus­tralians.

Education initiatives

ECAJ cam­paigned to make Holo­caust edu­ca­tion manda­to­ry in schools. 

Recog­nis­ing that this must be sup­ple­ment­ed with anti­semitism edu­ca­tion, we will be spear­head­ing the launch of edu­ca­tion pro­grams in schools through­out Aus­tralia to ensure that teach­ers, par­ents and stu­dents are equipped to recog­nise and take action against anti­semitism.

International partnerships

As the offi­cial nation­al roof body, we are proud to give our Aus­tralian Jew­ish com­mu­ni­ty a strong voice in a glob­al con­text.

We val­ue our affil­i­a­tion with the World Jew­ish Con­gress and part­ner­ship with the Anti Defama­tion League and the J7 Task­force as plat­forms to devel­op and imple­ment ideas and strate­gies that enrich Jew­ish life. 

Help us improve

Close

Thanks for visting our website today. Can you spare a minute to give us feedback on our website? We're always looking for ways to improve our site.

Did you find what you came here for today?
How likely are you to recommend this website to a friend or colleague? On a scale from 0 (least likely) to 10 (most likely).
0 is least likely; 10 is most likely.
Subscribe pop-up tile

Stay up to date with a weekly newsletter and breaking news updates from the ECAJ, the voice of the Australian Jewish community.

Name