Jewish students tell royal commission of Nazi salutes and campus harassment
Five days into the investigation launched after the Bondi massacre, it was revealed that Australian Jews were constantly harassed at universities.
Universities are struggling with opaque complaints processes and debates about what constitutes antisemitism, with universities receiving increasing complaints about overt or subjective antisemitism towards staff and students from late 2023, the Royal Commission into Antisemitism and Social Cohesion was told.
Much of this internal debate centered on what definition of antisemitism should be the starting point and where the line should be drawn between criticism of the Israeli regime and harassment of Australian Jews.
Less academic is the fact that many staff and students wearing Star of David necklaces or kippahs have been shouted at, abused and openly intimidated because of their religion.
The fourth block of hearings at the Royal Commission were held in Melbourne this week and will continue next week.
Melbourne hosted so many hearings because, although the royal commission was established in response to the terrorist attack at Bondi Beach, Melbourne has Australia’s largest Jewish community.
The commission heard from patrons of UNSW, the University of Sydney, the Australian National University Canberra, the University of Melbourne and Monash University Melbourne.
Former ANU student Liat* opened Monday’s hearing. Witnesses like Liat were granted pseudonym protection at the commission after witnesses faced a lot of harassment after testifying.
Liat, unlike others who felt unsafe, chose to have her face published at the hearing. He said he was a Zionist.
ANU hosted the country’s largest Gaza solidarity camp, comprising 21 Australian universities, following other protest movements in the US and UK in the first few months of 2024.
“I have been called a baby killer and a supporter of genocide on a relatively regular basis,” he said.
He began hiding his Magen David necklace and legacy because he was afraid to reveal his Hebrew name, even to baristas.
“I wouldn’t use my name when ordering in cafes for fear of someone asking me where I came from,” he said.
“Whether or not to call myself by my given name in a cafe was a decision I never thought I needed to make, and it made me think about a lot of things – about my safety at ANU and more broadly in Australia.”
Another unnamed Australian Jew was a former UNSW teacher who gave evidence under the name ACJ. He taught business courses to international students at UNSW College, which is wholly owned by UNSW.
“Four students stood up inside the classroom twice and gave me the Heil Hitler Nazi salute in the classroom, then immediately turned towards me outside in the hallway and gave me the Heil Hitler Nazi salute,” he said.
“I felt extremely threatened by the incident.
“Because of my family history, the fact that my grandparents were Holocaust survivors, the Nazis tried to kill all the Jews, and they murdered most of my family… When someone gives a Nazi salute, it feels like they want to kill me.”
In one of the most high-profile campus incidents broadcast before he testified this week, University of Melbourne physicist Steven Prawer’s office was occupied by about 20 protesters.
“I don’t know what their intentions were, but when a Jew who had some experience of what was going on in Israel saw a person wearing a mask, you could only see his eyes,” Professor Prawer said.
“What’s left is covered in keffiyeh. It’s a classic terrorist pose.”
“They said, ‘We’ve been waiting for you. Why don’t you come in and chat with us?’ I told them please go. I’m happy to chat with you, but please come back after you make an appointment,” he said.
The problem faced by many people, such as Professor Prawer, Liat and ACJ, was the opaque complaints system at their university.
Professor Prawer said that the students who occupied his office were kept away from him while they objected to the punishments imposed by the university and that he was not given the university’s incident report.
“You need sunlight to see whether these investigations are carried out properly and completely,” Professor Prawer said.
“Students are still masked by our systems even today.
“I still don’t know who they are. I also feel like for my own safety, I need to know who these people are if I see them on campus.”
“These suspensions will expire in a week so they will be able to re-enroll. I also have no idea if they are on campus”.
