QUT under fire for antisemitic display at anti-racism symposium

January 24, 2025 by Rob Klein
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The Queensland University of Technology (QUT) is under intense scrutiny after an antisemitic image was displayed during a “comedy” event associated with its controversial National Symposium on Unifying Anti-Racist Research and Action.

The Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ) and the Queensland Jewish Board of Deputies (QJBD) have both condemned the event, accusing the university of enabling a platform for hatred under the guise of anti-racism.

The offensive image, which appeared in a presentation by Sarah Schwartz of the anti-Zionist Jewish Council of Australia on January 22, featured a caricature labelled “Dutton’s Jew,” referencing Opposition Leader Peter Dutton. The slide included a list of racist stereotypes, a move that has sparked widespread outrage. ECAJ President Daniel Aghion KC condemned the display, stating, “The image is clearly intended to stigmatize as evil and racist any Jewish person who might support the Coalition. It is ironic that such an obvious and disgraceful racist trope has been used at an event that billed itself as an anti-racism symposium.”

Jason Steinberg, President of the Queensland Jewish Board of Deputies, also expressed his outrage, revealing that his organization had contacted QUT earlier in the week to raise concerns about the symposium’s potential for antisemitic content. “We wrote to QUT and asked them to make sure that this symposium was safe for everybody to attend and that it wasn’t peddling antisemitic tropes,” Steinberg said. “To see what has now transpired—it’s topsy-turvy, it’s upside down. This is an anti-racism research and action conference, and they’ve got speakers and people showing slides which are clearly racist against Jews, clearly racist against anyone who supports Israel. It’s disgraceful.”

Despite prior warnings from Jewish community leaders, QUT reportedly did not respond adequately. Steinberg criticized the university’s inaction, stating, “They never responded to us in any meaningful way to commit to keeping everyone safe and ensuring that it stayed within human rights law. We support free speech, but people shouldn’t be allowed to be racist or antisemitic or vilify any group.” He added, “You’d have to be living under a rock in Australia not to understand how offensive this image is. It’s not comedy—it’s offensive, and it’s not funny.”

Critics have pointed to the symposium’s speaker lineup as further evidence of its anti-Israel bias. “Most of the speakers appear to have been selected because they are anti-Israel extremists,” Steinberg remarked.

The controversy has now reached national attention, with ECAJ forwarding details of the incident to the Chair of the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights, which is currently conducting an inquiry into antisemitism at Australian universities. ECAJ President Daniel Aghion KC warned that QUT leadership would need to answer for their decisions. “We expect the Inquiry to require those responsible at QUT to attend before the Committee and account for their actions,” he said.

In response to the mounting backlash, QUT Vice-Chancellor Margaret Sheil defended the symposium, insisting that it was intended to foster diverse perspectives and academic freedom. However, Jewish community leaders have dismissed these justifications as empty rhetoric. “It’s abhorrent,” Steinberg stated. “For the Vice-Chancellor or any academic institution to prioritize free speech over combating hate speech is unacceptable.”

The incident has reignited concerns over antisemitism on Australian campuses, with Jewish leaders warning that universities are becoming increasingly hostile environments for Jewish students and faculty. “A steady drip feed of events like these are slowly turning swathes of our universities into propaganda factories instead of places of learning,” Aghion warned. “Freedom of expression does not permit freedom to hate others, and QUT leadership has failed to grasp this basic principle.”

Liberal MP Andrew Wallace is a former student at QUT.

He said: “Public universities should be places for inquiry, invention, and ideas – not the hate and antisemitism which we have seen this week and over the past 16 months. And we must be clear: this is not just a problem for Jewish students and staff.

The Australian Union of Jewish Students said in their submission to the Joint Committee on Human Rights inquiry into antisemitism in Australian universities that the growing normalisation of extremist support and rhetoric “creates a hostile environment for all students on campus and a particularly uncomfortable one for Jewish students”.

In their submission to the same inquiry, QUT claimed that “racism, cultural stereotyping, religious discrimination and other forms of discrimination are not tolerated at QUT”.

It is my expectation that QUT will respond to the incident accordingly.

But the remedy to Australia’s antisemitism in crisis isn’t in the singular response of university campuses. What we need is strong and principled national leadership. Instead, we have a careless and clueless Federal Labor Government systematically campaigning against Israel and the Jewish people for its own crass political ends.

To that end, I call on:

The Federal Education Minister to withhold Federal funding from the Queensland University of Technology until it investigates this matter and acts decisively to stop the spread of antisemitism on its campus;
The Federal Labor Government to establish an independent Judicial Inquiry into Antisemitism on Australian Campuses, beyond the politics and partiality of a parliamentary inquiry; and
The Prime Minister to step up on antisemitism or stand down from office.”

Enough is enough. Australians demand strong leadership on antisemitism. We’ve seen the price of unbridled antisemitism – it is violent and virulent. It looks like the pogroms, concentration camps, and mass murder of the Holocaust. It looks like the massacres of October 7, 2023. And it starts with cowardice in the face of crisis.

Andrew is the Chair of the Australia-Israel Allies Caucus and Deputy Chair of Parliament’s powerful intelligence and security committee.”

 

Comments

One Response to “QUT under fire for antisemitic display at anti-racism symposium”
  1. Liat Kirby says:

    To use this image in this way is an extraordinary turn of events. Diabolical. Offensive to an extreme. Inciting racism at a symposium that is supposed to be anti-racism. Come down on it like a ton of bricks. Stop the symposium in its tracks and make QUT pay for what they have done.

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