The following story by Natalie O’Brien appears in today’s Australian newspaper: Australia’s most outspoken Muslim leader, Sheik Taj Din al-Hilali, has compared the Israeli bombing of Gaza to the Holocaust, sparking outrage among Jewish groups. Sheik Hilali, the imam of the nation’s biggest mosque at Lakemba, southwest Sydney, lashed out at the Israeli leaders, branding…
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Articulating a different kind of Judaism
One of the aims of Independent Australian Jewish Voices is to provide a space for voices that usually get lost in the hardline Zionist rhetoric that passes for mature commentary in our media and communities. We have a new blogger, Naomi Potipa, who comes from a traditional Zionist background but is starting to open her…
Bringing it home
A good example of global issues taking root in local communities, such as Melbourne’s suburbs: Moreland Council has publicly condemned the “Israeli massacre in Gaza”. Cr John Kavanagh was the lone voice of dissent against Cr Enver Erdogan’s successful motion to condemn Israel’s actions at last week’s council meeting. Although a ceasefire is now in…
Why can Israel get away with it?
Haaretz, January 4: The forces that entered the Gaza Strip last night represented the largest ground operation in the coastal territory since Israel withdrew in the summer of 2005. Palestinian sources reported massive artillery shelling and air force strikes accompanying the advance of the infantry, armored and combat engineering corps. The ground invasion was preceded…
What would baby Jesus do?
My recent book, The Blogging Revolution, discusses the role of internet censorship in so-called “repressive” regimes. I wrote an article for the Melbourne Age last November detailing the various reasons why Australia’s current plans to implement an online censorship program was practically, morally and ethically suspect. Now, early in 2009, supporters of this scheme are…
United against oppression
Following my talk last Friday at Sydney’s Imam Husain Islamic Centre, one of the organisers of the event, Ali Alsamail, asked if I would publish a Muslim perspective on the proceedings. The following piece is by him: Imam Husain Islamic Centre is unique among places of worship. In my visits there, I always find a…
Be uncritical or shut up
Zionists constantly tell us that Israel is a holy entity that most Jews love unconditionally and want to feel closer to. Perhaps not: Although American Jews and Israelis share a strong and mutual feeling of solidarity, U.S. coreligionists have a very low willingness to strengthen the relationship, according to a new study on the subject.…
Imam Husain Islamic Centre talk on Israel/Palestine
I spoke last night to a packed room of around 170 people at Sydney’s Imam Husain Islamic Centre (all photos here): I was honoured to engage with a large Muslim audience (as I was told that the idea of a Jew speaking to such a group happened rarely, if ever, due to the fear of…
No really, I love you
Tom Switzer, former opinion editor of the Australian newspaper and research fellow at the conservative think-tank Institute of Public Affairs, redefines the term, ‘”getting too close to power“: Tom Switzer in The Spectator has a close encounter of the ex-prime-ministerial kind My wife Sarah and I recently had the wonderful experience of having John Howard…
Muslims, Christians and Jews together
One of the many events I’m doing in Sydney and elsewhere on alternative Jewish voices and organising opposition to the dominant Zionist narrative in our political and media elite: