Matt Burnell (Spence, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise today to join the Prime Minister and many other members to express my heartfelt condolences to the families and loved ones of Edith Brutman, Dan Elkayam, Boris and Sofia Gurman, Alexander Kleytman, Rabbi Yaakov Levitan, Peter Meagher, Reuven Morrison, Marika Pogany, Rabbi Eli Schlanger, Adam Smyth, Boris Tetleroyd, Tania Tretiak, Tibor Weitzen and Matilda, aged just 10 years old: 15 people, 15 souls, 15 innocent lives. They were loved; they were known; they were part of families, part of a community and friends to many; and they should still be here. To their families and loved ones: we cannot undo what has been done; we cannot take away your grief; but in this place, here today, we can honour their memory, we can mourn with you and we can stand with you, and we can commit ourselves to ensuring that our country never accepts hatred as normality and to doing so whilst the Australian Jewish community carries this grief—a grief so profound that no family or community should ever have to carry it.

These lives were lost on the first night of Hanukkah, as Jewish Australians came together to mark a moment of faith, identity and tradition—Hanukkah, a time of lights; a time of resilience; a time of gathering together, openly and proudly, to affirm what you believe and who you are; a time meant for moments of joy and togetherness, not fear. This wasn't a random act of violence, nor an act of senseless violence. This was a targeted, premeditated act of antisemitic violence. It was an act of evil. It is a reminder, albeit a confronting one, that Australia is not immune from hatred directed at people because of who they are or who they worship. We have always wanted to think of this kind of violence as not something that happens on our shores, but it is a reality that we must now confront, no matter how ugly this may be.

Even in that darkness, Australians did what Australians do best. In the face of such immeasurable evil, and at the very real risk of injury or death, they steeled themselves and made the conscious decision to run towards danger, not away from it—doing so to protect, in most instances, complete strangers. That courage deserves to be recognised in this place—an example of the best of humanity, in the face of the worst unfolding in front of them.

That courage in a moment of crisis does not remove the responsibility that sits with all of us here today. No Australian should ever have to think twice before celebrating their faith in public, and no Australian should ever feel they have to hide who they worship in order to feel safe or in order to be safe. In Australia, we cannot become a place where Jewish Australians are made to feel that their faith must be practised quietly behind closed doors, because that is not who we are. We are a proud multicultural, multifaith nation. Every Australian should be able to live their life openly, safely and with dignity. It is now on all of us in this place to uphold and set this standard: to refuse to excuse hate; to refuse to qualify it or downplay it; and to make it clear that Jewish Australians have every right to live their lives without fear or intimidation and without further acts of wanton violence.

In my electorate of Spence, we grieve with Australia's Jewish community. When an atrocity such as this happens, it doesn't remain in one place. It reaches across our country. It leaves entire communities shaken, searching for reassurance that they are safe in the nation they call home.

To the Australian Jewish community: I stand with you, and we, here in this place, stand with you. We stand with you in grief and in solidarity. May those who have lost their lives rest in eternal peace, but may their memories live on and may their families find comfort, in time, surrounded by a community and a nation that refuses to look away.

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