February 25, 2025
The surge in antisemitism has become Australia’s number one security concern, overtaking terrorism and foreign interference, the nation’s spy chief has claimed.
Australian Security Intelligence Organisation director-general Mike Burgess told a Senate committee that while antisemitism had long festered, he worried anti-Jewish hatred had become normalised in the aftermath of the October 7 Hamas terror attack on Israel, given international protests over its military response.
Synagogues have been set on fire and high-profile outbreaks of anti-Israel and anti-Jewish graffiti sprees have blighted neighbourhoods with significant Jewish populations.
“We have seen a number of worrying things that were threatening and intimidating and when that goes left unchecked in society that may well create an environment where it gives violence more permission,” Burgess told estimates in response to questions from opposition home affairs spokesman James Paterson.
“There is also something that I am on the public record talking about. Again for me, it defies logic, that people can hold Jewish Australians to account for the actions of the Israeli state. It beggars belief that they hold state and territory and federal governments to account for the actions of another sovereign nation.
“But some people have those views and they have very strong views that might drive a small number of those to think that violence is acceptable, especially if you have got this deep-seated view that you’re antisemitic and the environment and the conditions have given antisemites an excuse to go into the open in ways which we all agree are unacceptable.”
The explosion in antisemitic incidents has sparked a welter of criticism from the opposition, Jewish Australians and the Israeli government that the Albanese government moved too slowly to stamp it out.
Federal Police have established a taskforce to investigate antisemitic crimes while the government buckled to the Coalition’s demands for mandatory minimum sentences in new hate crimes laws passed earlier this month.
Burgess said there were no indications antisemitism had plateaued but hoped a strong police response would see a reduction.
“Right now in terms of my organisation and threats to way of life [and] threats to life, it is my agency’s number one priority because of the weight of incidents we are seeing play out in this country,” Burgess said.
Paterson asked when ASIO would have ever said a form of racism was the number one security concern.
“I don’t believe we have done that in our history. It is the volume of incidents we are dealing with,” Burgess said.
The spy chief said he did not believe the wave of antisemitism was being driven by one foreign actor but was keeping an open mind that foreign interference was involved.