Australia's spy chief says antisemitism was left unchecked after Gaza war
ASIO chief Mike Burgess tells the Bondi Beach inquiry that unchecked antisemitism was "normalized," with Iran's revolutionary guard blamed for two attacks
Antisemitism in Australia was left unchecked after the October 2023 outbreak of the Israel-Gaza war, fueling violence against Jewish people, the country's spy chief told an inquiry into the Bondi Beach mass shooting on Monday.
The comments came during public hearings in the wide-ranging inquiry, known as a Royal Commission, examining the events leading up to last December's Bondi attack, which killed 15 people attending a Jewish Hanukkah celebration.
Mike Burgess, director-general of security at the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO), said the spike in antisemitic incidents had contributed to the agency's decision to raise the national terrorism threat level to "probable" in August 2024. "There is no doubt that the war in the Middle East invoked a range of emotions in Australia," he said.
"Some of those violent aspects ... and those behaviors, including antisemitism that, in our view, were left unchecked, were therefore normalized and gave more permission for violence ... and Jewish Australians were on the receiving end," Burgess said.
From late 2024, Burgess said, antisemitism escalated in severity from "threatening, intimidating behavior to direct targeting of people, businesses, and places of worship." Such incidents included vandalism and arson attacks on homes, schools, synagogues, and vehicles in the months before the Bondi attack.
Burgess said the agency had concluded that Iran's elite Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps was behind two antisemitic attacks — on a kosher restaurant in Sydney and on Melbourne's Adass Israel Synagogue — a finding that led to the expulsion of Iran's ambassador in August. He said Iran was probably involved in more attacks, but that ASIO "just can't quite get there" in pinpointing responsibility.
"They use their network of proxies and agents to do their bidding, and that is to bring harm to Jewish people wherever they are in the world," Burgess said.
The commission's first block of hearings this month focused on the nature and prevalence of antisemitism, taking testimony from members of the Jewish community.