Communities reckon with identity a year after October 7

[Pelican Press 0]

This is the hidden content, please

• Sign In
• or
• Sign Up

Communities reckon with identity a year after October 7

A year ago, some of Australia’s most overlooked communities were thrust into the limelight.

They have been grappling with their identities ever since.

On October 7, 2023, ****** – considered a ********** group by the *********** government – launched a cross-border ******* on ******* from Gaza, beginning a new phase in a 76-year-long conflict.

More than 1200 people were ******* in the ******** and another 250 were taken ********, ******* reported, as images of missing loved ones and ******** festival goers fleeing gunfire spread online.

Australia’s response was swift.

The Sydney Opera House was illuminated in the blue and white of the ******** flag while politicians condemned ******.

******* then initiated its largest military ******** on Gaza, which has continued unabated.

Its forces have bombed hospitals, mosques, churches and schools, and ***** siege to a starving population as ******** Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vows to “annihilate” ******.

******* has ******* more than 41,000 people and displaced almost two million in the year since, according to Gaza’s health ministry.

************ parents cradling their children’s shrouded bodies, smoke billowing over Gaza, dusty limbs peeking out from a mountain of rubble: these graphics have flashed across *********** phones day in, day out.

This has caused the ************ community to reflect on their roots, Australia Palestine Advocacy Network president Nasser Mashni said.

“There has been a massive reconnection of the ************ diaspora to Palestine,” he told AAP.

Many Australians across the nation, regardless of their background, have rallied behind the ************ community, with thousands taking to the streets every week.

Exile, dispossession, disenfranchisement, and resistance to these hardships, have long been key aspects of ************ life.

But unlike *******’s previous offensives, this onslaught has been broadcast across the world, increasing engagement and giving strength to Palestinians’ decades-long conversations about ******* as a “colonial, apartheid, *******, settler state”.

“I’m just so broken that it took such a tragedy for the humanity of Palestinians to be recognised,” Mr Mashni said.

“The only comfort I get is that the impunity and normalcy that ******* enjoyed on October 6 has evaporated.”

*******’s actions have forced Australia’s ******* community to make a choice.

Some have become more critical of the state, choosing to forge new identities in solidarity with other groups.

Many others have felt their links to ******* and the Zionist movement for a ******* state strengthen as they grow more fearful and turn to each other for support.

There have always been different factions and views within the community, but they have become more visible as newly established organisations such as the ******* Council of Australia offer alternative voices.

“A lot of Jews’ eyes have been opened,” ******* Council executive officer Max Kaiser told AAP.

“Jews feel they have to speak out, that they have an obligation.”

This has magnified fractures within the community as family arguments flare and relationships splinter.

The Executive Council of *********** Jewry, a peak representative body, acknowledges differences of opinion but co-chief executive Alex Ryvchin insists the ******* Council and like-minded individuals represent only a handful of the community.

Otherwise, there is “almost unanimity” on war in the Middle East, defeating ****** and maintaining stability in Australia.

“People feel a great commitment and sense of duty to their fellow ******* Australians to stand together in solidarity,” Mr Ryvchin said.

“We’ve all sought to deepen our identities, and I think that’s been a positive reaction to trauma.”

The ******* community’s hyper-visibility has fuelled anti-Semitism and far-right *********** theories, according to Dr Kaiser.

This has had consequences for people critical of *******, some of whom have received ****** from their own community, and those with more traditional views.

“The events of October 7 … revealed something that exists in this country that many of us thought couldn’t and didn’t – and that is a depth of hatred,” Mr Ryvchin said.

Australia’s ******** circles have echoed a similar sentiment, and according to Australia ******* & ******* Affairs Council research associate Ran Porat, many feel a bolstered sense of patriotism alongside frustration at Australia’s position.

The federal government’s stance has ebbed and flowed.

In December, Australia broke from the US to vote for a ******* Nations resolution demanding an immediate humanitarian ceasefire, before halting funding to the UN aid organisation dedicated to serving ************ refugees in January following allegations its staff assisted in the ****** *******.

Three months later, *********** aid worker Zomi Frankcom was ******* in an ******** airstrike, fuelling the ***** under politicians’ feet.

In the year since ************ asylum seekers began arriving in Australia, the government started offering humanitarian visas after nine months, whereas Ukrainians and Afghans fleeing conflict received these same pathways within two.

Meanwhile, tensions within Australia have continued to simmer, with Prime Minister Anthony Albanese calling on citizens to “lower the temperature” and appointing two special envoys – one to combat anti-Semitism and another to tackle Islamophobia.

********* in the Middle East is likely to persist after the ******** Defence Forces started their invasion into Lebanon.

In two weeks, ******* has ******* more than 1000 Lebanese people and left one million without homes.

*********** Lebanese Association president Raymond Najar says his community has grown increasingly concerned and frustrated.

“We are powerless to do anything,” he said.

Iran also launched about 200 missiles at ******* on Wednesday, though most were shot down by the nation’s iron dome air defence system.

Mr Netanyahu has vowed to retaliate.

“This genocide is worse than anything we’ve ever seen,” Mr Mashni said.

But even as the situation escalates, his community ******** resilient as the enthusiasm of young Australians re-energises their spirits.

“Palestinians do not – cannot – give in to despair or hopelessness. Palestinians are the most hopeful people on Earth,” he said.

“I thought I’d be ‘Mr Palestine’ until my last breath.

“I now know it’s just my job to hold this space until that next generation of smarter, better, more powerful advocates take over.”

This is the hidden content, please

• Sign In
• or
• Sign Up

#Communities #reckon #identity #year #October

This is the hidden content, please

• Sign In
• or
• Sign Up

This is the hidden content, please

• Sign In
• or
• Sign Up