Please consider supporting our mission to help everyone better understand and become smarter about the Jewish world. A gift of any amount helps keep our platform free of advertising and accessible to all.
This is a guest essay by Shane Shmuel, an opinion and political writer.
You can also listen to the podcast version of this essay on Apple Podcasts, YouTube Music, YouTube, and Spotify.
At a recent launch in Melbourne of the book “Bondi Terror: The Tragedy, the Courage, the Aftermath,” written by investigative journalist Sharri Markson and Alex Ryvchin (co-chief executive officer of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry), Markson posed two questions weighing heavily on Jewish Australians:
“Is there something worse still to come? Have the lessons of Bondi truly been learned, especially by our political leaders and law enforcement?”
These questions capture the fear, anger, and uncertainty gripping Australia’s Jewish community.
Since the December 2025 terrorist massacre at Bondi Beach, where 15 innocent people were murdered celebrating Chanukah, Jewish Australians have confronted an unimaginable reality. Are we safe in our homes, schools, and synagogues? Can we trust those responsible for protecting us?
A government’s most fundamental responsibility is the safety and security of its citizens. Yet Bondi has left many Jewish Australians questioning whether political considerations have taken precedence over that duty.
Could something worse still happen? Tragically, we cannot dismiss that possibility. Bondi demonstrated what can happen when hatred is allowed to escalate into violence. Until Jewish Australians see evidence that the threats identified before the massacre are being confronted decisively, the fear of another attack will remain.
For more than two years, our community warned about escalating antisemitism and attacks on Jewish institutions. What matters now is whether Australia has learned anything.
Since Bondi, our community has experienced profound grief, exhaustion, anger, and betrayal. Jewish organizations have supported victims and strengthened security. Thousands gathered in solidarity, determined not to allow terrorism to extinguish Jewish life. But behind that resilience lies a devastating question: Are we still safe in our own country?
Why must we enter synagogues through security fences, past armed guards and surveillance cameras simply to practise our faith? Why do our children require armed guards, security fences, and cameras to enter the same school campuses we attended without such precautions? When did being visibly Jewish become a security risk in Australia?
These threats should never be accepted as normal. Jewish Australians have not merely enjoyed Australia’s freedoms. We have helped defend and build this nation.
General Sir John Monash, the Australian-born son of Jewish immigrants, commanded the Australian Corps during decisive Allied victories in World War I, becoming one of Australia’s greatest military leaders.
For generations, Jewish Australians have contributed to virtually every facet of Australian life: business, medicine, scientific research, law, education, the arts, journalism, philanthropy, and countless other professions. They have created businesses, supported hospitals, enriched our culture, and strengthened Australian institutions.
How can a country which Jewish Australians helped build and defend accept that their grandchildren need armed protection simply to attend school or synagogue? No Australian child should believe armed guards are the price of being Jewish.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese initially resisted demands for a federal royal commission following Bondi, announcing one only after sustained pressure from victims’ families, Jewish leaders, and prominent Australians. Why did grieving families have to fight for an inquiry into such a devastating terrorist attack?
Controversies surrounding taxpayer grants to organizations accused of spreading antisemitic rhetoric have compounded concerns about government oversight. Jewish Australians need more than condolences. We need confidence that authorities will confront threats before another tragedy.
Some leading Islamic organizations condemned Bondi. But a bigger question must be asked: What do those condemnations mean when further examples of antisemitic preaching in mosques continue to emerge? Words of sympathy ring hollow if they are not accompanied by a willingness to confront hatred within one’s own institutions.
Equally troubling are questions surrounding substantial taxpayer-funded grants awarded in the name of “social cohesion,” including scrutiny of organizations accused of promoting or tolerating antisemitic rhetoric. Where is the social cohesion? What safeguards ensure public money is strengthening mutual respect rather than reaching organizations whose conduct undermines it? It seems more about buying votes.
Jewish organizations pursued legal action against preacher Wisam Haddad, whose sermons were found to breach Australia’s racial discrimination laws. In November 2023, Haddad quoted a religious passage describing Jews hiding behind trees and stones, ending: “There is a Yahudi [Jew] behind me, come and kill him.” Why should Jewish organizations bear the burden of challenging such rhetoric? Why aren’t existing laws being enforced more effectively?
Some Muslim leaders have condemned incitement. Muslim Australian Ahmed al-Ahmed demonstrated extraordinary courage confronting an armed terrorist at Bondi. The issue is extremist Islamic ideology and whether religious institutions and authorities are confronting it effectively. The Holocaust did not begin with gas chambers. It began with propaganda, boycotts, exclusion, and discriminatory laws before escalating into genocide.
Australia is not Nazi Germany, but history warns against normalizing antisemitism. The Albanese government’s response deserves scrutiny over whether it has done enough to prevent that normalization.
And where is the rest of Australia? Many non-Jewish Australians showed extraordinary compassion since Bondi. Yet we need widespread outrage when synagogues are attacked, schools vandalized, and Jewish students intimidated. There is a difference between mourning Jews after they have been murdered and defending them while they face threats.
And why do protests continue following the Gaza ceasefire? Peaceful protest is a democratic right. But antisemitic intimidation, glorification of terrorism, and threats of violence cross the line and demand a response. This concerns more than Israel or Gaza. It raises questions about defending Western democratic values: freedom, tolerance, and equality before the law.
It begins with the Jews, but it never ends with the Jews. A society tolerating hatred against one minority risks endangering everyone’s freedoms.
Perhaps most heartbreaking is that I find myself grateful my Holocaust survivor grandparents are no longer here to witness what is happening in Australia. My grandfather recorded his Holocaust testimony for Steven Spielberg’s Shoah Foundation in the 1990s. He concluded:
“You are lucky to grow up in a country like Australia, a country free of the antisemitism we grew up with in Poland. Don’t let anyone make you feel second class. Always be kind to all mankind, but importantly, always be a proud Jew.”
What would he think of firebombed synagogues, Jewish children requiring armed security, and families murdered celebrating Chanukah?
I am thankful he never witnessed Bondi. But I know his message: Stand tall, remain kind, never feel second class, always be a proud Jew. I carry those words whenever I write or speak publicly.
As we await December’s final report, the Royal Commission is expected to recommend improvements to intelligence, policing, and security. But will it also examine political decisions, failures of enforcement, and institutional tolerance that may have allowed antisemitism to become entrenched?
Questions remain about the extent to which senior government ministers and extremist preachers have faced public questioning. Will there be accountability for government failures, scrutiny of social cohesion funding, and meaningful consequences for those unlawfully promoting hatred? Or merely another set of security recommendations?
A Royal Commission cannot itself impose criminal penalties, but it can expose failures and recommend action.
My grandfather believed Australia would protect his descendants from the hatred he endured in Poland. I want future generations to believe that too. If things don’t change fundamentally, don’t be surprised when another Bondi happens. Because “Never Again” cannot simply be something we say after Jews have been murdered. It must be something we defend while they are still alive.
Excellent article. for my money the solution in Australia, Europe, and the US is to run any and all Islamics out of Dodge as the old Western saying goes. These people are incapable of living in peace with anyone, anywhere. Personally, the real problem is all the bloodthirsty imams/mullahs. I'm Catholic here in the US and if one of my priests spoke like this just how long would it be before the authorities showed up?
Unfortunately Australia has become just like America with regards to the Jewish community. My holocaust survivor family never imagined that my grandkids would need armed guards at their schools.