Attacks against Jews hit high in Australia

By · December 2, 2007

Attacks against Australian Jews have reached a record high in 2007.

The Executive Council of Australian Jewry’ s annual report on anti-Semitism published this week logged 638 anti-Semitic incidents this year, including assault, intimidation, vandalism and harassment.

The previous record – more than 550 anti-Semitic incidents – was in 2002, when the second intifada was at its height.

Jeremy Jones, who has been logging anti-Semitic incidents in Australia since 1989, said new media platforms such as YouTube and Facebook were becoming popular domains for anti-Semites. But he said the wider Australian community was not inherently negative to Jews.

The most reported instance of anti-Semitism in Australia in the past year was the assault in Melbourne on Menachem Vorchheimer, an Orthodox Jew, by an Australian Rules player.

Vorchheimer took three of the perpetrators to court; they were fined and one also received a conviction. A fourth man, who punched Vorchheimer, has not been apprehended.