A leading United Nations expert has said antisemitism is “toxic to democracy” as he reported his findings on the rise in Jew-hate to the General Assembly. Ahmed Shaheed, UN’s Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Religion or Belief, noted that antisemitism was rising on both the left and right. “I am alarmed by the growing use…
As I write this foreword to Clyde Holding’s 1975 Sam Cohen Memorial Lecture, this country is embroiled in an election campaign made bitter and divisive by extraordinary and undemocratic actions never before known in Australia. I take no smug satisfaction from prophetic words I used towards the end of the 1971 Inaugural Sam Cohen Memorial…
Here in Jerusalem, I acknowledge the first Australians, whose culture we honour this evening as among the oldest continuing cultures in human history. So we gather at Yad Vashem. I have been to this place before and so has my wife Therese. We have been here not as the representatives of any government; we have…
On 6 December 1938 —almost 80 years ago— during a warm summer evening in Melbourne one man led a protest in an attempt to protect a discriminated against, marginalised peoples on the other side of the world. A protest was truly ahead of its time in its courage and foresight. That man was William Cooper,…