Antisemitism royal commission updates: Witnesses tell of being cancelled, gaslit and accused of supporting genocide; Jillian Segal warns of ‘fashionable’ antisemitism

This brings us to the end of our live coverage of the fourth day of hearings of the Royal Commission into Antisemitism and Social Cohesion.

Today we heard from workers about their experiences of antisemitism in the workplace, including a woman who was forced to change her “obviously Jewish” name.

We also heard from a nurse who described feeling scared as a patient herself, after two Bankstown nurses were filmed allegedly threatening Jewish patients.

The president of a Jewish junior football club also told the commission of sickening abuse hurled towards players, some as young as seven, including being told “Hitler should have finished you off”.

Special Envoy to Combat Antisemitism Jillian Segal also told the commission of antisemitic trends, describing it as a “virus” that has become more popular online.

The commission will return for another day of hearings tomorrow.

We’re onto the final witness of the day, Dr Laurence Schneider, a Sydney cardiologist.

Schneider is describing to the commission an incident at his wedding in 2024, when he and his wife were disrupted by two women walking by.

“They obviously recognised this as a Jewish function and started yelling ‘free Palestine’,” he said.

They were forced to stop the ceremony for a few minutes as the women were confronted.

“Do we now need to have security at all of our Jewish events … these two women, they felt emboldened and secure in being able to disrupt a Jewish function, felt secure that there wouldn’t be repercussions,” he said.

“I think they felt incredibly empowered because of the nine months preceding that for every single week they had their friends and family saying the same slogan and having no consequence.”

Schneider said the use of the “free Palestine” slogan is antisemitic.

Segal is telling the royal commission that speaking up is not just the role of political leaders, it is also important for sporting, judicial, religious and business leaders to speak out.

Criticism of the actions of the Israeli government are fair but criticism of the existence of the state of Israel, or criticism of Jews, is stepping into “different territory”, Segal said.

“We’ve got values of civility, of mateship, of equality, of fairness, and antisemitism as a hatred of a particular group goes against all those. And I think we need to absolutely combat it,” she said.

Players as young as seven years old have been subjected to antisemitic abuse on the football field, Ajax JFC president Daniel Onas is telling the commission.

One child went to shake the hand of the opposition player, who instead made an offensive gesture and said, “free Palestine”, the royal commission has heard.

“It’s a very difficult thing for young kids to have to endure when really all they should be doing is playing football, and they carry that with them beyond just the Sunday games,” Onas said.

The club engaged the Jewish Community Security Group (CSG) to run training for players and parents about how to manage the risks of antisemitism and how to handle in-game incidents.

In 2024 there was an average of one incident per week across the season, Onas said.

“So you can imagine the impact of that on our volunteers,” he said.

The commission is now hearing from Daniel Onas, president of the Ajax Junior Football Club in Melbourne.

He’s describing incidents of antisemitism young players have faced from opposition teams.

“An opposition player asked one of our players if they were Jewish and, innocently enough, the player responded that he was, to which the opposition player remarked, ‘Hitler should have finished you off’,” Onas said.

In another game in the under-18 division a player said, “you f--- Jews”, a parent was called a “bloody Jew” and an opposition player attempted to remove a Jewish player’s kippah.

“It was a finals game. Football is well known to be a very emotional, physical game, and so finals always bring additional levels of heat,” Onas said.

“But … the number of individual references and continued aggression shown towards our players was incredibly dehumanising.”

A Jewish woman who is giving her evidence anonymously is telling the commission that the chief executive of her workplace requested she use a “less obviously Jewish” name at work to avoid offending a client.

The woman, known as ABM, is relaying a conversation she had with her boss, who told her about the client’s sensitivities towards Israel. The woman’s name made her easily identifiable as a Jewish person, she said.

Ultimately, the chief executive requested she use a different name at work to avoid any negative commercial outcomes.

“I felt a sense of shame I hadn’t felt before. Not because I’m ashamed of being Jewish, I’m a proud Jew, but because I was made aware that something so deeply personal to me could be negatively viewed by others,” she said.

“I found myself questioning my value and questioning my impact.”

She ultimately left the company.

Sarah, a clinical psychologist, is telling the commission about her experience as a Jewish person in academia and treating Jewish students in her practice.

Jewish children she has treated have asked “why do they hate us?” Sarah told the commission.

Counsel assisting Zelie Heger, SC, is now asking Sarah about her experience in a Facebook group for psychologists that was originally meant for sharing resources like books and journals.

Since October 7, posts about the war in Gaza became more frequent and “heated”, and included petitions and polls about the role of therapists as activists, she said.

Ultimately, hostility towards Jewish clinicians meant she had to leave the group, she said.