Case Explained: Revised Hate Crimes Bill Passes, Albanese Faces Backlash – Legal Perspective

The Jewish community has accused the Albanese government of many crimes and misdemeanours since the Hamas attacks of October 7, 2023.

Some of them have been demonstrably justified – Foreign Minister Penny Wong’s failure to visit the sites of Hamas attacks during her visit to Israel, the government’s tepid response to the university encampments, and the long delay in responding to Jillian Segal’s antisemitism plan.

Several other flashpoints have been driven by a feeling of resentment over the broader community’s solidarity with Palestine but blind eye to Hamas, which boiled over after the Sydney Harbour Bridge march and the government’s recognition of Palestinian statehood.

These grievances were felt so deeply that Prime Minister Albanese was not invited to the funerals of the Bondi Beach victims. The Governor-General, Sam Mostyn, told The Jewish Independent she has been inundated by people demanding that she sack him. The targeting of the prime minister is understandable, given the rise in antisemitic incidents under his watch, but he cannot be held personally accountable for what happened on December 14.

However, in the aftermath of the terror attack, there can be no doubt that Albanese has been found sorely wanting as a national leader, in terms of personal authority, political judgment and policy responses.

After weeks of unfathomable resistance, he was dragged into calling a Royal Commission into antisemitism. The overwhelming message of the delay, as the clamour grew around him, was that his heart was not in it. The fact that he called it an inquiry into “antisemitism and social cohesion” was clearly a compromise.