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(JNS) Police are searching for three suspects in connection with the torching of the Adass Israel Synagogue in Melbourne, Australia, on Dec. 6, according to Victoria police chief commissioner Shane Patton, who told reporters on Monday that the arson was being treated as a terrorist attack.
While he said “significant progress” had already been made in the investigation, he declined to provide further details.
No one was hurt in the fire, but the synagogue was heavily damaged.
Victoria state premier Jacinta Allen said on Monday that the “evil, antisemitic attack … has now been declared a terror attack,” noting that “additional resources” could therefore be diverted to the probe.
Mask-wearing assailants on Friday set ablaze the Orthodox synagogue in Ripponlea, a suburb of Melbourne.
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese on Monday announced the creation of a federal police taskforce to combat antisemitism, which will be deployed across the country to tackle threats, violence and hatred toward the Jewish community and parliamentarians.
“Antisemitism is a major threat, and antisemitism has been on the rise,” said Albanese.
Albanese, whose left-wing Labor government has been accused of pursuing anti-Israel policies, declined to address claims by his Israeli counterpart, Benjamin Netanyahu, that these positions had helped ignite the attack.
Asked about these allegations, Albanese said during an interview on Sunday: “Well, that is a matter for Mr. Netanyahu, but can I make this point very clearly, that 157 countries supported the resolution that was passed by the United Nations.”
Albanese was referencing a Dec. 4 vote at the U.N. General Assembly that called on Israel to “bring to an end its unlawful presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory as rapidly as possible.” Australia has traditionally opposed or abstained from voting on resolutions employing such language.
On Friday, Netanyahu suggested that the torching of the synagogue was inextricably linked to the Labor government in Canberra’s “extreme anti-Israelism.”
“Unfortunately, it is impossible to separate this reprehensible act from the extreme anti-Israeli position of the Labor government in Australia, including the scandalous decision to support the U.N. resolution calling on Israel ‘to bring an end to its unlawful presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, as rapidly as possible,’ and preventing a former Israeli minister from entering the country.
“Anti-Israel sentiment is antisemitism,” Netanyahu said.
Earlier on Friday, Israeli President Isaac Herzog spoke with Albanese, during which the former expressed his “firm condemnation” of the arson attack.
“Following the atrocities carried out by Hamas against Israel on and since Oct. 7, 2023, there has been an intolerable wave of attacks on Jewish communities in Australia and around the world,” said Herzog.
“I noted to the Prime Minister [Albanese] that this rise and the increasingly serious antisemitic attacks on the Jewish community required firm and strong action and that this was a message that must be heard clearly from Australia’s leaders. I thanked him for his ongoing efforts to combat antisemitism, and expressed my trust that the local law enforcement would do everything in their power to bring the perpetrators to justice,” added the president.
New research reveals the extent of Jew-hatred in Australia since the Hamas-led Oct. 7 attacks.
The Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ) released a report on Dec. 1 which showed that during the year following the massacre, 2,062 anti-Jewish incidents were reported in Australia, up from 495 in the previous 12-month period.
Physical assaults shot up even higher—going from 11 in 2023 to 65 in 2024, a 491% increase.
In response to the report, Australia’s Opposition Leader Peter Dutton, head of the Liberal Party, said that “this is not just a Jewish issue—it is a national crisis, and it demands urgent action. Enough is enough.”
In July, anti-Israel activists vandalized the oldest synagogue in Sydney, displaying a large banner outside the front entrance reading “SANCTION ISRAEL,” along with PLO flags.
A month later, more than 500 students at the University of Sydney voted to reject a motion to condemn Hamas’s Oct. 7 massacre, drawing international criticism.
Earlier this month, the Australian government declined to grant an entry visa to former Israeli justice minister Ayelet Shaked, who had planned to travel there to attend a pro-Israel event.
Shaked told Israel’s Channel 12 News that the decision was due to “the anti-Israel and radically pro-Palestinian” policies of the current Australian government, which has been led by the left-wing Labor Party since 2022.
Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong said in April that Canberra would consider recognition of a Palestinian state. Her government has walked back the decision by the previous Liberal Party government to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.
