Statement of Fmr Prime Minister Naftali Bennett on the Bondi Beach Hanukkah Massacre and the wave of Antisemitism in Australia:
*The writing was on the wall. The Australian government bears responsibility.*
Tonight Jews were attacked in Australia in the Bondi Beach Hanukkah massacre.
A Jewish holiday gathering turned into a scene of terror.
This is a moment of grief, and time for accountability.
I have just spoken with several Jewish community leaders in Sydney.
They are fearful and outraged.
For months they warned of rising antisemitism.
The writing was on the wall. It was ignored.
This violence did not come out of nowhere.
When antisemitic hatred is tolerated and threats are downplayed, attacks become inevitable.
I demand that the Australian government take immediate, decisive action to protect Jewish communities and confront antisemitism as the serious threat it is.
Statements of sympathy are no longer enough.
Jews should not have to fear for their lives anywhere, including Australia.
Hersh is dead. He suffered a year in hell. The agony of an amputated hand. Then he was murdered by Hamas.
I hope he knew how much his parents loved him. How their love for him inspired millions across the globe, it crossed party lines and social wars.
We failed to save him💔
27 August 1940 | Dutch Jewish boy, Eric Louis Löwenthal, was born in Enschede.
He was deported to #Auschwitz from #Westerbork in February 1944. He was murdered in a gas chamber after arrival selection.
Israel was established in 1948. But Jews lived in the region for thousands of years.
Before Israel existed, here’s what Jews in the Middle East could NOT do:
1. Ride horses.
2. Be eye level with Muslims.
3. Had to pay tax not to be murdered and pillaged.
4. Could not testify against a Muslim in court.
5. Could not bear arms.
6. Could not move freely after certain hours.
7. Couldn’t dress without imposed Jewish symbols (like the yellow stars we saw in the Holocaust.)
In 1941, my grandma survived the Farhud. It was massacre against the Jewish community of Iraq, encouraged by the Nazis. Thousands of Jews were attacked by a mobs, which was backed by the Iraqi government.
My grandma had to flee Iraq - they even took her citizenship. So did with other 150,000 Jews.
Today there are no Jews in Iraq.
They were ethnically cleansed.
This didn’t just happen in Iraq. Jews were ethnically cleansed throughout the Middle East and North Africa.
Almost a million Jew ran for their lives. The only place to take them wasn’t America, or Britain— it was Israel.
Israel saved my Iraqi mother and my Tunisian father.
It will continue to save Jews from everywhere else.
https://t.co/FC49hhSuV0