Australia should not have been shocked by the homicidal nurses

I wasn’t shocked by the recent video of two Sydney nurses bragging about killing Israelis patients.  

I was disgusted, of course, and grateful they had been caught on camera. It was sickening to see how comfortable they felt making such claims in their workplace – a hospital, where their job was to provide medical care to patients of all identities. 

But I’ve been hearing these kinds of sentiments for 16 months now. Looking through Instagram a few days after October 7, 2023, I realised that Australia has a massive problem.  

My Jewish friends were devasted by the news that their friends and family had been attacked and murdered during the Hamas massacre. Angry mobs had defiled the steps of the Sydney Opera House, screaming “Fuck the Jews” as they burned Israeli flags. 

But many of my non-Jewish friends and acquaintances, particularly from the queer and arts scenes, posted content that denied, justified or outright supported the October 7 attack.  

The social media post that shocked me to my core came from  an academic known for their left wing, queer activism, who shared a post from X to their Instagram page. Written by journalist Najma Sharif Alawi on October 8, 2023, it read: 

“What did ya’ll think decolonization meant? Vibes? Papers? Essays? Losers.” 

I was horrified. We ran in the same social circles. I’d had drinks with their partner at a friend’s home. Now, here they were, mocking a terrorist attack that had targeted my community with the most brutal acts of violence, kidnapping and murder.  

Over the next few weeks, I watched in shock as dozens of non-Jewish friends and acquaintances,  reposted similar content. When I condemned Hamas and supported the hostages on my Instagram, most of them unfollowed me or cut contact. They’ve never spoken to me again. 

The discourse justifying murder, rape and kidnapping in pro-Palestinian circles is widespread, almost ubiquitous. When I trawled through Instagram in the days after October 7, I found almost every pro-Palestine Instagram page justified or endorsed the terrorist attack.  

On October 8, 2023, the Australian Palestine Advocacy Network (APAN) released a statement saying it “stands by the Palestinian people in Gaza.” Referring to the massacre, it said “the response from the Palestinians came yesterday crushing Netanyahu and Israel’s expansionist aspirations.” When APAN’s leader, Nasser Mashni, appeared on ABC’s Q+A in November, he refused to condemn Hamas. 

On October 9, 2023, activist group Free Palestine Melbourne posted about a ‘snap action’ rally it had organised in response to October 7, saying that Palestinians had “humiliated the Israeli regime.” Nowhere in these posts was there any condemnation of the murder or kidnapping of innocent civilians, nor any mention of the words ‘Hamas’ or ‘terrorists.’  

Support for violent jihadism spilled out onto Australian streets, with Hamas and Hezbollah flags repeatedly displayed at pro-Palestine rallies, accompanied by chants like, “there is only one solution, intifada revolution.” 

 Last September, at a pro-Palestine rally in Melbourne, a large of group of men waved Hezbollah flags and carried photos of the terrorist organisation’s leader Hassan Nasrallah, who had been assassinated that week. In Arabic, the men chanted: “Khaybar, Khaybar, oh Jews! The army of Muhammad will return!” The chant references the subjugation, expulsion and massacre of Jews in early Islamic history. 

That rally was  endorsed by the Australian Greens party and every major Australian pro-Palestine organisation. 

Tasnim Sammak,  one of the organisers of the rally defended the display of the Hezbollah flag on The Project the next day. “We’re seeing today in the news that some of the mosques around Sydney, that are more from the Shia community, they’re also holding events to mourn Nasrallah. And I don’t think that it’s right to harass community members because they held a flag that, for them, represents many things, even though the Australian government wants to reduce it to a representation of an evil ideology,” she said.

Sadly, hateful rhetoric describing the murder of Jews and Israelis has prompted so little public outrage, that I cynically wondered whether there would be any real consequences for the nurses captured in that video.  

I was wrong about that. Their misuse of their power as nurses and their blatant hate was met with  strong condemnations from the NSW health minister, demonstrations by fellow nurses, and a mass media response. The nurses will likely never work in the Australian healthcare system again. 

The public might have been less surprised had they listened to Sharon Stoliar, a nurse who nearly lost her job after trying to expose allegations of antisemitism within the New South Wales Health system. Stoliar, who is not Jewish but is married to an Israeli Jew, repeatedly raised the alarm about healthcare workers organising protests in the wake of October 7. One of her biggest concerns was the fact they were chanting “from the river to the sea,” which many Jewish groups state is a genocidal slogan, calling for the destruction of Israel. 

The nurses video provoked outrage but it was largely reported as if it were an isolated incident. In fact it is  a “mask off” moment. What the nurses said about murdering Israelis is hardly different from chants of “Khaybar, Khaybar,” or the endorsement of terrorist organisations dedicated to murdering Jews. It’s a reflection of a problem that is far more widespread than we would like to admit, whether it’s online, on our streets, or in our hospitals.  

The failure of peak Musim bodies to wholeheartedly condemn the nurses' stated desire to kill Israelis shows that the nurses were not out of step with many in their community. A number of Muslim leaders have signed a letter deflecting criticism of the nurses. The groups said it was hypocritical to condemn the nurses, while the actions of the Israeli government in Gaza were met with "silence, dismissal, or complicity".

"The frustration and anger directed at Israel is a direct response to its violent and inhumane policies — not an expression of hatred toward Jewish people," they claimed.

Online, both Muslim and far-left social media activists have posted content either justifying or deflecting criticism of the nurses. 

For the broader public, because the nurses spoke explicitly – and on camera, it was finally impossible to ignore the violent intentions some people harbour towards Israelis and Jews. Now that we have the public’s attention, the question is what policymakers can do about it?