It was a Saturday afternoon during Simchat Torah, the last festival of the month-long Jewish High Holidays. Each year, it is a happy occasion; we dance in the synagogue and children are given bags of lollies as we gather to celebrate the year it took to finish reading the whole Torah.
On October 7, 2023, I arrived at my synagogue in Melbourne with my husband and children. Because it was during a festival when Orthodox Jews do not use phones, money or electricity, I had been disconnected from technology. I did not yet know that hours earlier, Hamas had conducted a massive attack in Israel that would result in the brutal killing of some 1,200 people, including around 800 civilians.
I remember the hush that rippled through the crowd when a security guard arrived to let us know that a war had broken out in Israel. What do you mean there were hundreds of Israeli casualties? I wondered. How could there be dozens of hostages taken back into Gaza?
My life has changed since that day. In Australia, though we are geographically far from the Middle East, October 7 marked a seismic shift for my community. Antisemitism is rising, and many in my community worry about our safety. None of the victims of October 7 felt random to me. Jews account for approximately 14 million people worldwide, or 0.2% of the global population, and I had many connections with many of those murdered. This involved my sister-in-law’s cousin, Adi Vital Kaploun, who was murdered in her home in Kibbutz Holit in front of her two children, who later appeared in a Hamas clip that surfaced in Telegram.
Israel’s actions in Gaza also mean Palestinians are facing untold danger. I see the horrific videos, including that of Sha’ban al-Dalou in the courtyard of a hospital connected to an IV drip as he is burnt alive after an Israeli airstrike. I see the destruction of so many homes in Gaza, the many people who are suffering and now homeless. I feel heartbroken for Palestinians who are not part of Hamas, whose relatives and children have been killed by Israel and had their businesses and homes destroyed. I follow Palestinian journalists on social media and am horrified by the carnage they are living through.
But ever since October 7, there are also palpable concerns of personal safety for Jewish people that are real and experienced daily. I find myself witnessing my 7-year-old son practising active shooter drills at his after-school Hebrew classes, something he never did before October 7, a stark reminder of the threats that have grown too close to home. In Caulfield, the suburb where I live and ran for Parliament in 2022 as a teal independent, there is unease in the air. At my children’s Jewish kindergarten, security has increased, parents have been volunteering to monitor drop-off and pick-up times, and larger fences have been built. I often think twice about whether it is safe to go to my synagogue or a Jewish institution.
Just a few months ago, Melbourne’s largest Jewish day school, Mount Scopus Memorial College in Burwood, was daubed in graffiti that said “Jew Die”, and last November, a synagogue around the corner from my home was evacuated after a violent protest. Sometimes I ask my sons, who are seven and three years old, to wear baseball caps over their skullcaps, nervous that our Jewish observance may make us a target for abuse when we go out in public.
I know that most Australians are kind and thoughtful people. I know that the debates about Israel and Palestine and Australia’s approach will continue as long as this war rages. But I also want to share my experiences of this conflict to show how it affects the lives of Jewish people, that we not only have family members who were killed or who knew people killed on October 7 but are also feeling unsafe in Australia. Every day, a conflict that is thousands of kilometres away from Melbourne affects my life. Some of my siblings live in Israel, many of my friends live there and I feel a deep connection to my Jewish culture and heritage.
In the year since the war between Hamas and Israel began, many Australian Jews are bereft. We feel that we have been abandoned and ignored by many progressive allies who weren’t able to unequivocally condemn the murder of Israeli civilians and the rape of Israeli women on October 7. For me, October 7 marked a watershed moment; in the weeks that followed I quit my role on the board of the Faith Communities Council of Victoria, which was unable to condemn the murder of Jews on October 7. It was wounding that an organisation that I had invested so much time and effort into couldn’t be clear in its denunciation of terrorism.
The past year has felt like one of the hardest I can remember in Australia. This is the country my grandfather, a Holocaust survivor, chose for its promise of safety and distance from the horrors of Europe. The Middle East may be far, but the pain, fear, and grief are felt daily — both for those we mourn in Israel and for those suffering in Gaza. We all deserve peace, but it feels further away than ever.
