In the Media

Daily Telegraph, The Mercury – 5 October 2024

October 7, 2023, is a date that will be forever seared into the memory of the Jewish world – a day in which our worst nightmares came true, and our greatest fears were realised.

On that fateful day, the Jewish people witnessed a pogrom on a scale that had not been seen in most of our lifetimes – the single biggest loss of Jewish life in a single day since the Holocaust.

Pogroms are not new to the Jewish people. The soil of both Europe and the Middle East is soaked with Jewish blood. Even so, witnessing a pogrom in our time, and in our generation, occurring in the only Jewish State on the planet, triggers emotions and traumas that resonate deeply within our psyche.

The stories of our families in Israel subjugated to murder, torture, rape, or abduction into indefinite captivity and mistreatment broke our collective hearts and elevated our anxiety levels to heights never experienced before.

And yet October 7 was not even the end of the story. Instead, it launched a whole new chapter in the oldest story of all.

Because it did not take long before the antisemitism that many desperately wished was a remnant of a less civilised time in history resurfaced in fire and fury.

It started just two days after the October 7 massacre when demonstrators burnt Israeli flags and shouted, “F**k the Jews!” at Australia’s iconic Sydney Opera House.

It continued in the streets of Sydney where radical imams expressed joy and elation at what had befallen the Jews in Israel.

And in weekly protests in Melbourne, the State of Israel was accused of genocide, and “Zionists”, the overwhelming majority of all Jews, were targeted and denounced.

Mass demonstrations took place in New York, in London, in Toronto denouncing the Jewish state and celebrating Hamas’ mass murder of civilians.

It continued in university campuses in America and in Australia and in England, where tent cities were set up, with students chanting, “From the River to the Sea, Palestine will be free” – the genocidal call for the ethnic cleansing of Jews from the State of Israel. “Zionists” were again targeted and excluded.

The Jewish people were barely allowed one moment of respite, to mourn and grieve, before they were under attack once again.

Unfortunately, this was not limited to rowdy protesters. Many governments around the world, while showing initial sympathy to Israel, quickly changed the focus from Israeli suffering to Palestinian suffering.

Canada and the United Kingdom withdrew export licences for weapons being shipped to Israel, under the guise that human rights were being violated.

Israel was falsely accused of instigating famine in Gaza, of targeting civilians, of “collective punishment”,  of indiscriminate bombing. South Africa – increasingly a Hamas ally – even took Israel to the International Court of Justice accusing it of genocide.

Rather than sympathising with the State of Israel in its most desperate hour, after it had been the victim of the clearest possible aggression and war crimes, many rushed to flip the narrative to portray Israel as the aggressor.

As Israel continues fighting a defensive war on seven fronts, all of them instigated by Iran, much of the world, including the Australian government, keeps calling on and pressuring Israel to implement a ceasefire. There was no effective pressure on Iran and its cartel of terrorist proxies, who openly say they are fighting to destroy the Jewish state.

On October 1, the IDF released classified information on the plans of Hezbollah, the most dangerous of those enemy proxies, to launch an October 7-style massacre against the citizens of northern Israel, but on an even larger scale, late last year.

Then, on the eve of the Jewish New Year, Iran fired over 180 ballistic missiles aimed at the population centres of central Israel. Thankfully, Israel’s defensive systems managed to shoot down many of those missiles, preventing major casualties. Yet some are now demanding Israel “de-escalate.”

It’s been one year since October 7, yet for many, time hasn’t moved. For the family of the hostages still held in Hamas’ lightless dungeons, time remains frozen. And for the families who witnessed their parents and their children, their brothers and sisters, murdered in front of their very eyes, how can time ever move on again?

After the Holocaust, the Jewish people vowed that never again would Jews be at the mercy of others, powerless to fight the barbarians baying at the door.

One year later, Israel is fighting to make that vow a reality, making huge strides against Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon, despite their use of ugly human shield tactics designed to guarantee civilian casualties. Both are today a shadow of their former selves.

It makes no moral or strategic sense to demand Israel end this battle against Hamas and Hezbollah before it reaches a point where it can be assuredly said that the vow that there will “Never Again” be a repetition of October 7 has become a reality.