Australia urged to back new seven-nation plan to curb antisemitic violence

London: Britain has offered to host an effort by seven nations including Australia to counter antisemitism after being urged to do more to stop a sharp rise in hatred and violence.

UK Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband made the offer to peak Jewish groups at a meeting in London to consider practical measures after incidents including the Bondi terror attack in December.

The move raises the prospect of a ministerial meeting convened by Miliband in Britain and attended by his counterparts – including Foreign Minister Penny Wong – if the proposal gains support from others.

The UK Foreign Office confirmed the plan in a statement after Miliband met leaders from the seven countries with the largest Jewish populations outside Israel, known as the J7 group.

The latest report from the J7 warned that last year was the deadliest year for Jews living outside Israel since 1994, reflecting the Bondi attack and the attack on a synagogue in Manchester one year ago.

The meeting included two members of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry: president Daniel Aghion, KC, and co-chief executive Peter Wertheim. The J7 groups represent the US, the UK, Canada, France, Germany, Argentina and Australia.

Wertheim told this masthead that he supported the offer of a ministerial meeting and hoped Australia would back the proposal.

“The surge in the scale and seriousness of antisemitic incidents over the last three years has not been confined to the borders of any one country,” he said.

“However, the drivers seem to be the same everywhere – namely ideological and religious fanaticism, often funded by malevolent state actors.

“An effective response will require concerted counter-action by Western democratic powers like the UK, Australia and the other J7 countries.

“So we would urge the Australian government to take up the British foreign secretary’s proposal to co-ordinate the measures they adopt to eradicate the scourge of antisemitism from public life.”

Miliband has come under intense criticism from some Jewish groups for the UK government’s decision to recognise a Palestinian state and impose sanctions on Israeli settlements in the West Bank.

UK Chief Rabbi Sir Ephraim Mirvis declared last month that the sanctions would bolster extremism rather than stop the problem.

Miliband rejected that argument but maintained his criticism of the Israeli government and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over the prosecution of the war in Gaza.

“Anyone who holds British Jews – or indeed Jews around the world – responsible for the actions of the Israeli government is engaging in antisemitism, pure and simple,” Miliband told the BBC last month.

Even so, Miliband’s meeting with the J7 group also included criticism of the UK’s stance and warnings that it would encourage antisemitism.

In a statement, the J7 said: “The group expressed serious concern about the recent UK government measures and rhetoric targeting Israel and the detrimental impact this decision had in their own countries and communities.”

The British debate about antisemitism intensified over the past week after Greens party members voted at their annual conference to declare that Zionism was racism.

Jewish groups strongly criticised the Greens’ new policy position and a senior figure in the party, Westminster leader Ellie Chowns, argued instead that Zionism was a “contested” concept.

Chowns told the BBC the new stance was a “significant and damaging” policy. It was passed in a motion approved by 1022 votes to 813.

In a statement after the Miliband meeting, the J7 groups said the British foreign secretary had expressed his “abhorrence” of the Greens’ motion.

Miliband also confirmed his support for the definition of antisemitism put forward by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance, which draws a distinction between targeting Jews as a group and criticising Israel.

“Manifestations might include the targeting of the state of Israel, conceived as a Jewish collectivity,” the alliance says in its definition.

“However, criticism of Israel similar to that levelled against any other country cannot be regarded as antisemitic.”

The latest J7 report on the threat to Jewish people, released in July, said the problem was a sustained crisis rather than a temporary surge.

“A total of 20 people were killed in antisemitic attacks in 2025, all in J7 countries: 15 murdered at a Hanukkah celebration on Bondi Beach in Sydney, two killed at Heaton Park Synagogue in Manchester on Yom Kippur, two killed at the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington, DC, and one killed in Boulder, Colorado,” it said.

Get a note directly from our foreign correspondents on what’s making headlines around the world. Sign up for our weekly What in the World newsletter.

You have reached your maximum number of saved items.

Remove items from your saved list to add more.

You've used all of your gift articles. 3 more will become available on the 1st of every month.