LIBERAL member for Caulfield David Southwick has called on Minister for Higher Education and Skills Peter Hall to meet with community leaders to discuss rising anti-Semitism on university campuses.
Southwick said the line between anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism had become increasingly blurred, citing the “intimidation and bullying tactics” of recent Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions protests.
Speaking in Parliament on Tuesday night, he said, “Data collected by the Anti-Defamation Commission shows regular occurrences of lectures being disrupted by anti-Israel groups, often using violent swastika imagery, and male students have reported having their skullcaps pulled from their heads while being verbally abused.”
Southwick recounted an incident at Melbourne University earlier this year which saw a Jewish student injured by a pro-Palestinian protestor brandishing wire cutters at a Yom Ha’atzmaut celebration.
A graduate of Monash University, Southwick accused university officials of burying their heads in the sand on the issue of violence and intimidation aimed at Jewish students, and he called on Hall to investigate.
“I call on the minister to meet with representatives of the Jewish community to hear these concerns, and to then see what can be done to halt these incredibly concerning developments.”
AJN STAFF
David Southwick
