Australia: Figures show high anti-Jewish aggression
Herald Sun reports Anti-Jewish attacks in Australia decreased in 2005, but latest figures show aggression towards Jewish community still 10 percent above average
Anti-Jewish attacks in Australia have decreased in 2005, but the latest figures show aggression towards the Jewish community is still 10 percent above average, the Australian-based Herald Sun reported.
According to the report, Australia's peak Jewish body, the Executive Council of Australian Jewry, said it had received 332 separate reports of anti-Jewish incidents in the 12 months to September 2005.
This is lower than the 445 reports last year, but above the annual average of 301 since national figures started being collated in 1989.
The Herald Sun said that incidents recorded during the past year included arson attacks on synagogues, vandalism and Nazi graffiti on private property belonging to Jewish Australians, assaults on Jewish people, and anti-Semitic vandalism of Jewish schools and synagogues.
A Newcastle Synagogue was subjected to anti-Jewish graffito, had its windows smashed and anti-Semitic posters glued to its exterior wall in April.
An alarming finding of the report was the "enormous amount of anti-Semitic invective on internet discussion groups and bulletin boards".
Anti-Jewish graffiti was recorded at a rate 39 percent above average, but hate mail and threatening phone calls were recorded at their lowest rates for 16 and 15 years, the report said.
