1. Reflections on the Lived Experience of Leading a Jewish Organisation in Australia
My name is Alon Cassuto and I am the Chief Executive Officer of the Zionist Federation of Australia (ZFA), an elected roof body of the Jewish Community representing over 200 Jewish and Zionist organisations across Australia.
I make this submission not only as the CEO of a Jewish communal organisation, but as someone living daily with the practical, emotional, financial and psychological consequences of antisemitism in Australia.
Much has already been said to this Commission about the rise in antisemitism since October 7. Jewish Australians have spoken about fear, harassment, intimidation, exclusion and hostility. I do not seek to repeat what others have already articulated.
Instead, I want to describe something more difficult to quantify.
The hidden burden.
The burden carried quietly by Jewish organisations, Jewish leadership, Jewish families and increasingly by those merely associated with us.
The burden that drains communal energy, confidence and capacity.
The burden that forces Jewish organisations to redirect extraordinary amounts of money, time and emotional bandwidth away from building Jewish life and toward protecting it.
This burden shapes nearly every decision we make.
And perhaps most concerningly, it is becoming normalised.
2. The Normalisation of the Abnormal
Perhaps the most confronting aspect of the past two years is how quickly abnormality becomes routine.
Jewish organisations now undertake security and secrecy measures that would once have been considered extraordinary.
Event locations are withheld until the last moment.
Professional security guards have become a standard operational expense and every registered participant must be individually vetted.
Threat assessments shape leadership decisions.
Staff members increasingly weigh whether publicly associating themselves with Jewish organisations is professionally or personally safe.
More than two years ago, we removed staff names and photographs from our website despite the enormous pride they take in their work.
These shifts are subtle, but deeply consequential. Over time, they begin to shape behaviour, decision-making and even the small ordinary calculations people make in daily life.
I remember my wife recently expressing discomfort with me wearing a T-shirt with Hebrew writing while going to a shopping centre in Perth.
That moment stayed with me.
Not because it was dramatic.
But because of how ordinary it felt.
A healthy democratic society should never become comfortable with the idea that ordinary Jewish communal life requires extraordinary measures or protection.
And yet, increasingly, this is becoming accepted as routine.
3. Australia, Belonging and the Quiet Fracturing of Confidence
My own family story is deeply tied to Australia.
My late grandfather, Trevor Rapke, served as Judge Advocate General of the Australian Navy, saw active service during World War II including in the Battle of the Coral Sea, later became a County Court Judge in Victoria and was eventually appointed an Officer of the Order of Australia for his public service. He was deeply involved in both Australian civic life and Jewish communal life, serving in leadership positions within the Victorian Jewish community and broader Zionist organisations while also becoming one of Victoria’s most respected jurists.
My great-grandmother, Julia Rapke, was a prominent human and civil rights advocate, feminist and refugee activist whose work and correspondence are now preserved in the National Library of Australia. She worked extensively on behalf of refugees during and after the Second World War, was involved in major Australian women’s organisations and also served in senior leadership positions within WIZO and the Zionist movement.
Australia gave extraordinary opportunity, safety and belonging to my family. In return, my family devoted itself deeply to this country and its institutions.
From my great-grandparents to my children, I have seen five generations of my family call Australia home with immense pride and with an almost instinctive confidence in the future of our hopes and dreams here.
Over the past two years, for the first time, I have watched that confidence begin to fracture.
And I know many Jewish families who feel the same.
Many Australian Jews grew up believing Australia represented one of the great success stories of multicultural democracy. The shock has not only been the rise in antisemitism itself, but the speed with which many Jews discovered how conditional their sense of safety and belonging could become.
That realisation has been profoundly destabilising.
4. When Ordinary Jewish Life Becomes a Security Operation
One of the clearest examples of this reality was the four-day visit of Israel’s President, His Excellency Isaac Herzog, to Australia in February this year.
Following the Bondi Beach terrorist attack, the ZFA engaged with both the Australian Government and the President’s office regarding a potential visit of solidarity. Those discussions ultimately led to President Herzog being invited by the Governor-General and Prime Minister to undertake an official state visit to Australia.
President Herzog, whose role is largely symbolic and non-political, holds a unique place in the hearts of Jewish communities around the world and has regularly travelled internationally to stand with Jewish communities during moments of significance, crisis and solidarity.
President Herzog came to Australia to stand with the victims of the Bondi attack and with the Australian Jewish community and the broader Australian community during a period of profound grief, trauma and uncertainty.
He was not coming to conduct political rallies.
He was coming to mourn, comfort and stand with a grieving community.
The timeframe from confirmation of the visit to arrival was approximately three weeks.
In that short period, the ZFA became responsible for coordinating major communal events in Sydney and Melbourne attended by thousands of people, including victims’ families, senior government officials, communal leaders, hundreds of school children and members of the broader Jewish community.
Almost immediately, serious security risks emerged.
We were informed that extensive road closures, fencing, barriers, metal detectors, secure perimeters and crowd management infrastructure would be required.
At multiple points we were asked by authorities to reconsider whether a communal event needed to take place at all and, if it did, whether it could instead be held inside a Jewish school or synagogue far from the CBD where protests were gathering.
The additional security burden alone exceeded $600,000 for the two communal events, virtually doubling their total cost.
These were not optional additions.
These were security requirements.
The ZFA was expected to somehow absorb or raise these funds within days.
It is difficult to adequately explain what this does to a community organisation.
We are not a corporation with unlimited reserves. We are not a government department. We are a charity with approximately 20 staff whose resources are ordinarily directed toward representing our community, Jewish education, youth leadership, Israel engagement, combating antisemitism, cultural connection and community building.
Instead, enormous communal resources had to be redirected toward protecting Jews attending what was fundamentally a respectful commemoration of the Bondi victims and a show of solidarity.
What was perhaps even more confronting was the atmosphere surrounding the events themselves.
There were credible fears that the events would be disrupted. Community members were warned about security threats. Some families chose not to attend because they feared violence. Some parents did not feel comfortable bringing their children.
At the conclusion of the Sydney event, attendees were effectively locked down inside the venue while police managed hostile protests outside. Families leaving the venue were instructed to walk in the opposite direction from the CBD for safety reasons and to remove identifying religious or cultural symbols.
After a heartfelt evening of communal mourning that moved many to tears, we removed our kippot from our heads and placed them in our pockets to walk through the streets of Sydney.
The emotional reality of this is difficult to overstate.
This occurred only weeks after Jewish Australians had already experienced the trauma of the Bondi attack. Members of our community who had directly lived through that attack were present at these events.
The message many Jews internalised was devastating: even gathering peacefully to mourn and receive comfort from the Head of the Jewish State invited by the Australian Government had become a security operation.
I want to be clear that both Victoria Police and New South Wales Police worked extraordinarily hard to protect our community. Many officers demonstrated professionalism, care and seriousness.
But the contrast between what is required for a Jewish communal event versus what would be required for almost any other comparable Australian community gathering is stark.
5. The Chilling Effect Beyond the Jewish Community
The burden increasingly extends beyond the Jewish community itself.
During the Herzog visit, we found it nearly impossible to secure venues willing to host the event or contractors willing to support it.
One of the major contractors engaged to provide production and logistical support for communal events became the target of an aggressive public smear campaign simply for working with the ZFA.
Activists contacted the company’s clients.
Staff became uncomfortable having their names and photographs displayed publicly on the business’s website, which was swiftly taken down.
Identifying information was removed from online platforms out of fear of harassment and reputational damage.
This is not legitimate protest.
It is intimidation. It is bullying. It is antisemitic.
Its long-term effect is difficult to quantify.
It creates a chilling effect in which businesses, contractors and professionals increasingly think twice before publicly associating with Jewish organisations.
That should give all Australians pause.
6. The Hidden Tax on Jewish Life
One of the central realities I hope this Commission understands is that antisemitism imposes what can only be described as a hidden tax on Jewish life.
Every dollar spent on extraordinary security measures is a dollar not spent building Jewish life.
Every hour spent managing threats is an hour not spent building community.
This hidden tax affects every layer of communal life:
Jewish schools.
Synagogues.
Youth movements.
Community centres.
Israel programs.
Leadership organisations.
The distortion extends even to children’s summer camps.
In late 2025, following the Bondi massacre, urgent requests were made for additional security funding across 18 Jewish youth camps involving approximately 2,300 children and staff members across Australia. The estimated additional security cost alone was approximately $500,000.
Following the Bondi attack and amid escalating antisemitism, many Jewish parents expressed fear about sending their children to camp without substantial visible security arrangements.
No minority community should regard it as normal that children’s summer camps require security operations resembling hardened infrastructure.
The long-term cumulative effect of this burden is enormous.
It affects whether events proceed.
Whether people attend.
Whether families feel safe.
Whether young Jews remain publicly engaged.
Whether talented people enter communal leadership.
Whether Jewish institutions can focus on growth rather than survival.
7. The Exhaustion of Constant Crisis Leadership
The cumulative exhaustion of Jewish communal leadership is difficult to fully explain.
Enormous amounts of time and emotional energy are now spent fielding communal anxiety, responding to incidents, preparing security responses, managing threats and reacting to public hostility.
This Royal Commission itself reflects that burden. Preparing submissions, encouraging others to participate, attending hearings and advocating publicly all require substantial emotional, operational and financial resources from a community already under strain.
Even participating in democratic processes now carries fear and consequence.
My Executive Assistant, whose role includes answering calls to the ZFA office, receives abusive phone calls on a weekly basis. She has been called a “baby killer” and a “Nazi” simply for working at a Jewish organisation.
This is not political disagreement.
It is harassment motivated by antisemitism.
Many people considering careers in Jewish communal life now quietly weigh questions such as:
Will this damage my future career opportunities?
Will I be judged professionally for working at a Zionist organisation?
Should I publicly list this role on LinkedIn?
There is now a baseline assumption that visible Jewish communal leadership carries personal, reputational and professional risk.
That reality is corrosive.
8. The Fear Has Become Personal
The impact extends beyond organisations.
It enters homes.
My own home has undergone security assessments conducted by communal security organisations. This is common for leaders in high-profile roles within our community. Recommendations were made for additional protective measures and infrastructure at significant personal cost. I have been advised these measures are not eligible for government security funding, meaning the burden must be borne personally or organisationally.
I think carefully about what I post publicly.
I avoid posting photographs of my family online.
I no longer read many comment sections because of the level of hatred and abuse. Every post I make, including the most innocuous and innocent of posts – such as congratulating a group of school children or celebrating Jewish identity at a school – receives a barrage of hate.
Many Jewish communal leaders now live with a constant low-level awareness around personal safety.
One moment that has remained with me involved my cousin and his five-year-old son.
At our annual Yom Ha’atzmaut celebrations, my cousin decided not to bring his son because he feared the possibility of an attack similar to Bondi.
That reality should deeply disturb Australians.
There are Jewish parents in Australia today who are frightened to bring their children to large-scale Jewish community events.
Not because of paranoia.
Because recent events have made those fears feel plausible.
9. The Robbing of Innocence – Israel Programs Information Evening
Another example involved our annual Israel Programs information evening for Year 12 students and parents considering gap year programs in Israel.
This is an event that Australian Jewish families have attended for generations.
It should be entirely unremarkable.
18 year olds determining what to do once they graduate.
Instead, after our event was advertised in mid-2025, activist networks began publicly targeting it online, accusing the ZFA of “radicalising youth” and “sending children to commit genocide”.
Calls circulated encouraging activists to sign up and disrupt the event.
We were forced to increase private security significantly, vet attendance lists containing hundreds of flagged sign-ups, prepare contingency plans and alter operational arrangements simply because Jewish teenagers were attending an information evening about spending a gap year in Israel.
The absurdity of this becomes obvious when compared to almost any other educational or youth travel program in Australia.
No equivalent event promoting travel to Europe or Asia would require anything remotely similar.
10 . The Loneliness of This Period
One of the more isolating aspects of this period has been the disconnect between the intensity with which these issues are experienced within the Jewish community and the relative silence surrounding them in broader Australian society.
I hold a public position at the heart of our community and, in many ways, I feel deeply supported. I regularly receive quiet messages of encouragement and solidarity from both Jewish and non-Jewish Australians. Those moments stay with me.
But I am also conscious that many others do not experience that same visibility or support.
Many friends working in non-Jewish workplaces have remarked that the Royal Commission and its work are rarely discussed around them at all. Some describe feeling as though they are carrying something emotionally consuming inside the Jewish community while navigating workplaces and social environments where it is barely acknowledged.
At times, it can feel as though antisemitism has become an all-consuming issue for the Jewish community while remaining peripheral to much of broader Australian life.
That silence can itself feel profoundly lonely.
11. The Risk to Australia
Perhaps most disturbing is the degree to which some activists now view ordinary Jewish Australians and Jewish organisations as inherently illegitimate or evil.
There are Australians who believe, and publicly espouse, that mainstream Jewish communal organisations, such as the ZFA, are equivalent to violent or extremist movements.
This is a profound societal failure.
The ZFA is not a fringe political organisation.
We are a broad representative roof body that includes religious, secular, progressive, conservative and diverse Jewish voices. We represent a wide cross-section of Australian Jewish life. We have maintained strong bipartisan relationships with government for nearly 100 years.
Yet the mere presence of the word “Zionist” has become enough for some to justify harassment, dehumanisation and hostility.
What is particularly painful for many Jews is the profound disconnect between how Zionism is now being labelled publicly by its vocal detractors and how it has actually been experienced within Jewish life over generations.
For many Australian Jews, Zionism was never experienced as a slogan of hatred or supremacy. It was woven into family history, Jewish identity, communal continuity and the belief that Jews, like other peoples, were entitled to safety, dignity and self-determination.
I think often about what it would feel like if, after proudly calling oneself Australian for five generations, the word “Australian” suddenly became synonymous in public discourse with fascism, racism, murder or evil.
The instinctive reaction would be: this is insane. I have not changed.
Over the past two years, many Jews have experienced precisely that disorientation.
Many of us have spent these years grieving deeply, carrying fear, anxiety and heartbreak while desperately wanting the suffering, death and hatred to end for everyone involved.
And yet, at times, we have simultaneously found ourselves recast as morally suspect simply for remaining visibly Jewish, Zionist or connected to our community.
That should trouble anyone who values a pluralistic society.
Because when a minority community increasingly feels that public visibility carries unacceptable personal risk, the long-term damage is not confined to that community alone.
It corrodes the confidence, openness and social trust upon which multicultural democracies depend.
12. A Final Reflection
The Zionist Federation of Australia was founded in 1927. Its founding President was Sir John Monash, one of Australia’s greatest military leaders and nation builders.
For generations, Australian Jews have contributed enormously to this country while simultaneously maintaining a deep connection to Jewish identity and to Israel.
Today, many Jews increasingly feel that these parts of their identity are being treated as socially illegitimate or unsafe.
That is deeply painful.
At times, it has felt as though this Commission and the issues it seeks to examine have consumed the emotional and organisational bandwidth of the Jewish community while remaining comparatively peripheral to much of broader Australian society.
Many Jewish Australians are following these hearings closely. Families discuss them around dinner tables. Community organisations have dedicated enormous time, emotional energy and resources toward participation, submissions and advocacy.
Yet despite the seriousness with which much of the Jewish community experiences these issues, this Commission itself has, at times, become the subject of efforts to delegitimise, undermine or portray concern about antisemitism as politically suspect. Including by high profile Australians who ought to know better.
That reality is deeply disorienting.
A society should be capable of examining hatred directed toward a minority community without the examination itself becoming controversial.
Most minority communities are afforded the basic dignity of explaining how prejudice manifests against them. Yet when it comes to antisemitism, Jewish voices are often uniquely subjected to interrogation, dismissal or demands to justify why something is offensive at all.
This Commission is immensely important. Yet for it to be effective, its findings and recommendations must ultimately carry moral weight beyond the Jewish community itself.
Because despite everything described in this submission, Australian Jews remain deeply invested in the future of this country.
We are continuing to build, contribute, lead and participate while carrying burdens that many Australians never see.
Even standing our ground now carries a cost.
The burden borne by Jewish Australians today is not only the burden of overt antisemitism. It is the cumulative burden of vigilance, explanation, security, advocacy, exhaustion and quiet adaptation.
And yet, despite all of this, the Australian Jewish community continues to believe deeply in Australia and in the possibility of a healthy pluralistic society.
This submission is not written from a place of disengagement from Australia, but from a deep love for the country my family and so many others have proudly called home for generations.
My hope is that this Commission helps Australia recognise not only the visible incidents of antisemitism, but also the quieter erosion occurring beneath them.
For this Commission to be successful, it must help restore confidence within the Australian Jewish community that there remains a strong, secure and thriving future for Jewish life in this country.
Because the long-term danger of failure is not only to the Jewish community.
It is to the values, cohesion and way of life upon which Australia itself depends.