Jewish children are being told to hide signs of their identity, switch off location sharing and avoid displaying Hebrew while travelling to camps as fears over their safety reshape Jewish life, the Royal Commission into Antisemitism and Social Cohesion has heard.
A Sydney-based Jewish youth leader, known as Witness ACV, said security concerns had transformed the way youth activities were conducted for children aged eight to 18.
Children attending camps were instructed to turn off location services on their phones and avoid wearing clothing or jewellery that identified them as Jewish while travelling in public.
“It’s a security risk to have any Hebrew or any identifying symbols while we’re in public,” she said.
“There’s a real threat that someone could target us if we are showing that part of us.”
The witness said the impact of the Bondi terrorist attack on December 14, 2025, was particularly evident at youth camps.
Children as young as eight who would normally have been homesick instead feared they would be attacked while sleeping.
“Many who usually would just be homesick were now crying because they were scared that someone was going to come and murder them in their sleep,” she said.
The Commission heard that some Jewish students had become desensitised to schoolyard abuse and downplayed antisemitism directed at them as a “joke”.
Witness ACV said youth movements provided children with a safe environment, but they could influence only a small part of their lives.
“The youth movement, while it can do a lot to provide safety and security for Jewish kids, at the end of the day, they’re only with us for two weeks, maybe on average three weeks a year,” she said.
“They spend a lot more time in schools. They spend a lot more time at home with their families, and I think that’s where the real changes need to be coming from.”
She urged changes to the school curriculum, saying Australian students learnt too little about Jewish history, culture and contemporary Jewish life.
“People really don’t understand what it means to be Jewish, what it means to be a minority in Australia, and I think that is a major failure of the education system that we have,” she said.
The witness said many non-Jewish students encountered Jewish history only briefly through lessons on the Holocaust during studies of the Second World War.
“Their only experience of learning about Jewish culture or Jewish history is during a term learning about World War II, a week learning about the Holocaust,” she said.
“It’s very, very minor. They don’t understand anything about contemporary Jewish society.”
She said students were rarely taught about Jewish traditions, holidays or religious practices unless they studied religion, and many schools did not include Judaism.
“Unless you meet Jews and interact with them, it’s very difficult to find out anything about Judaism,” she said.
Asked whether youth movements would eventually be able to reduce their security measures, Witness ACV said the risk remained too great.
“I think we have to ensure the kids’ safety. That’s our number one priority,” she said.
She said parents were likely to remain reluctant for at least several years to send children to camps without security.
Her evidence echoed testimony given a day earlier by Rabbinical Council of Victoria president Rabbi Moshe Kahn.
A survey conducted by the council found 90 per cent of rabbis had observed congregants concealing or minimising outward signs of their Jewish identity, while 85 per cent had personally experienced antisemitic conduct.
“The incredible amount of abuse just walking to and from the synagogue on a Saturday morning is something that we’ve just normalised, that’s accepted,” Rabbi Kahn told the Commission.
He said rabbis were carrying the burden of heightened security while antisemitic incidents were being investigated inconsistently.
Together, the evidence showed fear extending across generations, from children attending youth camps to adults deciding whether it was safe to display visible signs of their Jewish identity in public.