New Jewish Council seeks to draw a line between Jews and Israel

Conflating Jews and Israel fuels antisemitism, argues a new Australian Jewish anti-racism advocacy group.

Sarah Schwartz and Max Kaiser are on a mission. They want to inject a new perspective into the Australian debate on antisemitism and Israel. “We’re concerned that any criticism of Israel or any sort of pro-Palestinian solidarity activity gets labelled as antisemitic, which cheapens the idea of what antisemitism actually is – which is hatred of Jews, or discrimination and hostility towards Jews,” they say.

“Jewish community organisations have conflated Israel and Jews, which makes people think they are the same thing. But they're not the same thing. Israel is a state, and people are entitled to criticise any other country,” says Kaiser. “The conflation by the pro-Israel lobby and some Jewish organisations can fuel and lead to people making a conflation themselves, to blame all Jewish people for Israel's crimes – which is antisemitic,” Schwartz adds.

Schwartz is a human rights lawyer and university lecturer, while Kaiser is a historian with a PhD on antisemitism and Jewish antifascism. The pair have long been frustrated at the tenor of public debate on Israel and antisemitism, and Israel’s response to the Hamas attacks of October 7 was the tipping point. Last week they launched the Jewish Council of Australia to provide a new and different voice on what has become a hot-button issue in Australian politics.

Its main focus will be on racism in Australian society. “We’re concerned about antisemitism and about the rise of the far-right and fascist politics, and also about broader issues of racism in Australian society, whether that's Islamophobia, anti-Palestinian racism or racism against Aboriginal people,” Kaiser explains.