Jillian Segal has accused “far-left, issue-motivated” Australians of taking part in anti-Semitic incidents and rhetoric because it had become “almost fashionable” since the October 7 Hamas terror attack.
The nation’s anti-Semitism commissioner raised concerns in her testimony on the fourth day of hearings in Sydney that young Australians were subscribing to hurtful commentary online shared by “influencers”.
While describing drivers of anti-Semitism, Ms Segal told the Commission that online trends of people conflating criticism of the Government of Israel or the State of Israel with Jews were dangerous because they “easily” normalised it.
“Anti-Semitism is a virus, it’s an illness that has morphed and mutated over time,” she said.
“I think that there are a lot of people who disagree with the Government of Israel and with its decisions and the way it’s behaved, and they conflate that way back with the Jews.
“It’s the one that has helped push anti-Semitism from the margins to be normalised to the centre.
“It’s almost as if, in that last category, that those people who are doing the conflation don’t understand always what they’re doing. Some do and some don’t.
“It’s almost fashionable. So if someone that they follow online, an influencer, is of that view, they adopt that view.
“And so in one sense, it’s the most pernicious, because it just happens very easily.”
Testimonies throughout Thursday painted a picture of the new normal Jewish Australians were facing in the wake of the October 7 Hamas terror attack on Israelis at the Nova music festival.
A Jewish NSW midwife and nurse manager, who used the pseudonym AAV to protect her identity, told the inquiry she was subject to “under the breath” insults at work.
She said it included statements like, “shame on you” and “you must be really ashamed to belong to a group of child killers”.
Then as a patient herself for a knee surgery, AAV described the fear she felt for her treatment after two Sydney nurses were filmed spouting inflammatory rhetoric in an online video in February 2025.
The Commission moved to a behind closed doors session for a joint testimony from grandmother Judith Lewis and her daughter Karyn to avoid prejudicing criminal proceedings.
Their family established Lewis’ Continental Kitchen, which was a Bondi deli destroyed in a fire in October 2024.
“For us, it’s devastating. A lot of people came and met there, and were able to sit and eat. It was a communal centre. We’re not seeing all our friends, because the customers very much became our friends,” she said
Australian Jewish Amateur Association Football Club president Daniel Onas also told the commission of young players targeted with abuse on field and people refusing to shake their hands.
He described insults such as “Hitler should have finished you off”.
“It’s a very difficult thing for young kids to have to endure when really all they should be doing is playing football, and they carry that with them beyond just the Sunday games,” he said.
Sydney woman Stephanie Cunio was one of a dozen people with lived experience of anti-Semitism who was invited to take part in the public hearing on Thursday.
Ms Cunio, who has worked in the trade union and climate justice sector for more than three decades, she hasn’t always felt supported by friends and colleagues.
She described feeling “cancelled” unless she denounced her ties to the country of Israel.
Ms Cunio accused the political “left” and institutions like, universities, arts, unions and the climate movement, as not showing solidarity with Jews as they would for other migrant groups in the wake of the October 7 attack.
“The left could not stand in solidarity with Jews, as we were increasingly experiencing racial hatred and anti-Semitism since October 7,” she said.
“If any other group of migrants was experiencing that… the left would be marching in solidarity, speaking out in solidarity.
“There was silence in the university sector, the art sector, the trade union movement, the climate justice movement.
“I don’t know that it’s naivety or it’s political manoeuvring, but I don’t find it forgivable.”
Former newspaper editor of The Age and author Michael Gawenda described a similar feeling and told the Commission that some friends had stopped speaking with him.
“I used to have close connections with people I worked with. But a lot of them . . . no longer get in touch with me. Haven’t got in touch with me from October 7 onwards,” he said.
Several spoke about the October 9 pro-Palestine protest at the Sydney Opera House as a “turning point” for anti-Semitism in Australia and how it would be handled by authorities.
“I saw the demonstration at the Opera House. I was just surprised that it came so early. It deeply upset me,” Mr Gawenda said.
Ms Segal said after the demonstration from the town hall to the Opera House was just the start of a “whole host” of protests in the years which followed.
“That was a turning point where the response of the authorities was such that, it was not stopped, and the community was to now be on watch,” she said.
“There was this demonstration that was escorted by police onto the forecourt of the Opera House and then surrounded by police to allow them to demonstrate and burn flags and issue chants.
“On what should have been a day of solidarity with the Jewish people because of the horrors and what had happened.”
It comes after a man was charged over a protest outside the royal commission on Wednesday, over an allegedly offensive symbol on a T-shirt.
The man was initially moved on by police, and later attended Manly Police Station where he was arrested by officers. He is due to face Manly Local Court on May 27.
Commissioner Virginia Bell delivered 14 recommendations in her interim report late last month and is expected to delivered the final report on December 14 — which marks the one year anniversary of the Bondi Beach terror attack.
The commission will return for another day of hearings tomorrow
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