Israeli President Isaac Herzog has declared Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and his government “serious partners” in the global fight against antisemitism as he flies home to Jerusalem after a four-day state visit to Australia held in the shadow of the Bondi massacre.
Herzog’s comments to a Jewish community event in Melbourne on the final day of his Australian trip stand in stark contrast to the fury unleashed by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu immediately after the Bondi terrorist attack, when he accused Albanese of doing nothing to stop rising hatred against Jews.
“All discussions with the Australian leadership were conducted with candour, open-mindedness and a great deal of mutual respect,” Herzog said.
“I found serious partners who are willing to hold serious conversations and address the vile rhetoric, the misinformation, the shameful antisemitism head-on.”
Speaking at the same event, Victorian Premier Jacinta Allan pledged to keep supporting the Jewish community in the face of rising hate.
“The true measure of any great nation is whether people feel safe enough to be their best and free enough to contribute in full,” she said. “For generations, Australia offered that promise to the Jewish community and we must maintain that for generations to come.”
Herzog’s comments signal that, despite significant policy differences between the Albanese and Netanyahu governments over the recognition of Palestine, expansion of West Bank settlements and conduct of the war in Gaza, the foundations of the Australia-Israel relationship remain sound.
Herzog and Albanese held bilateral discussions in Canberra and earlier in the week, shared an intimate dinner at Kirribilli House attended by their respective partners, Michal Herzog and Jodie Haydon.
Albanese said he raised Australian aid worker Zomi Frankcom, who was killed by an IDF missile strike in Gaza, with the president and Israel’s further plans to fast-track the expansion of Jewish settlements in the West Bank.
In Melbourne on Thursday, Herzog met with Allan and Victorian Opposition Leader Jess Wilson at a formal reception at Government House before attending the community event at a convention centre in Southbank. The president cancelled a planned visit to the Adass Israel Synagogue, which was destroyed by arsonists in December 2024, due to security concerns.
Having arrived in Australia with a primary purpose of offering comfort and support to people dealing with the trauma of Bondi and other antisemitic attacks, Herzog said he would leave feeling buoyed by the resilience of the Jewish community.
“I feel that hope is in the air,” he said. “We came here to be with you, to look you in the eye, to embrace, to remember and weep together. And we wept.
“And still, I must tell you that we return to Israel feeling empowered because we have seen first hand the beauty and resilience of this community and its significance in the eyes of all Australians of goodwill.”
This builds on conciliatory comments made by Herzog earlier in the day when he told Seven’s Sunrise program that while the rise in antisemitism was frightening, the “silent majority of Australians” respected the Jewish community and wanted continued dialogue with Israel.
The president delivered a scornful rebuke to anti-Israel protesters gathered beyond a tight security perimeter outside the Southbank venue. “Go protest in front of the Iranian embassy,” he told the community event.
“To me, it is obscure and odd that we have to have so many incredible police officers protecting us and the inherent right of us to gather here as proud Jews to host the president of the only Jewish state on earth without any harassment and disturbance.”
The extensive security arrangements for the event meant that the 1500 people who attended, including Jewish community leaders, businessmen, rabbis and school children bussed in from Mount Scopus College and Bialik College, were required to go through multiple checks before entering the auditorium.
The location of the venue, which was chosen because it is outside the CBD and away from usual protest sites, was not disclosed to guests until the morning of the event. Outside, police lined a temporary, steel fence erected as a security perimeter, while police helicopters hovered overhead and mounted police waited in reserve.
Dovid Gutnick, the rabbi of the East Melbourne Synagogue also targeted by an arsonist, said this should not become a new normal for Jewish Australians.
“It is very disappointing that this is what it has come to,” he told this masthead shortly before Herzog took the stage. “Jewish people have come to an event to show solidarity with the Bondi community at a time of tremendous loss and grief. The Jewish community is saying that the president’s presence is meaningful. For people to go out and protest against that I think is a new low.
“It is very telling for our future that here in Australia we have to attend a Jewish event in a fortress.”
Zionist campaigner Mark Leibler, Executive Council of Australian Jewry president Daniel Aghion, businessman and philanthropist John Gandel, Israeli Ambassador to Australia Amir Maimon and Liberal deputy leader David Southwick were among the VIPs seated at the front of the large auditorium.
Herzog and other speakers, including ZFA president Jeremy Leibler, Bondi survivor Chavi Block-Israel, Allan and Wilson, each made a point of addressing directly the hundreds of school children towards the back of the room.
Leibler urged them to go to Israel as “the one place where Jewish history stopped being something that happened to us and became something that we are responsible for.”
Wilson said young Jewish people should “never have to hide your identity, lower your voice, tuck away your Star of David necklace or carry the burden of explaining or defending who you are.”
Block-Israel, was more blunt: “What they want is for the Jew to disappear, for Israel to disappear, but we are going nowhere.”
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Chip Le Grand leads our state politics reporting team. He previously served as the paper’s chief reporter and is a journalist of 30 years’ experience.Connect via email.