Burns cites abuse of his partner in submission

Macnamara Labor MP Josh Burns has absorbed two years of antisemitic abuse and says he can take it. What he cannot accept is what has been done to his partner.

In a detailed submission to the Royal Commission on Antisemitism and Social Cohesion, Burns documents the abuse aimed at himself, his staff, his family and his partner since October 7, 2023.

He is blunt about how it works. The abuse, he says, dehumanises Jewish identity to the point where Jews are cast as legitimate targets. Once that is accepted, anyone close to them becomes one too.

“By that logic, it is also fair game to attack my partner,” he told The AJN.

His partner is Victorian Animal Justice Party MLC (Member of the Legislative Council) Georgie Purcell. She is not Jewish and yet she is attacked because of her relationship with him.

“What we’ve seen is that Georgie gets exactly the same things,” Burns said.

“What has been most shocking is that, on top of all of those things about my Jewish identity, she also gets these misogynistic and often violent and sexualised comments directed at her — which is not a feature of the antisemitism that I get.”

Purcell, he said, has had “a Magen David drawn on her face at her office”.

Burns wants the Commission to deliver real change.

“This Royal Commission is such an important opportunity to have a change of direction in Australia,” he said.

“It is not the Australia that I grew up in. I don’t want my kids growing up in an Australia where this is normalised or acceptable. It needs to be stamped out.”

His submission makes three recommendations.

Institutions should adopt a clear working definition of antisemitism.

Governments should legislate a serious vilification offence.

And the Online Safety Act should be strengthened to protect people from online hate.

Much of the abuse, Burns said, has nothing to do with policy.

“Often it is an attack on Jewish identity, what it is to be Jewish,” he said.

“The claims about how Jewish people are inherently evil, or that there’s some sort of dual loyalty – that somehow Jews are not loyal to Australia, they’re loyal to Israel, and therefore are legitimate targets.”

That logic builds a pathway, the submission argues, “from stereotype, to blame, to justification”. At its most extreme, it ended in the Bondi terrorist attack on December 14 last year. Fifteen Australians were murdered.

The abuse has not stayed online. Burns’s St Kilda electorate office was firebombed in June 2024. The damage was estimated at $100,000. His staff field abusive calls, emails and voicemails as a matter of routine.

Burns singled out the Online Safety Act as a glaring gap. Right now, the eSafety Commissioner can order a platform to remove content that targets an individual. But it cannot act when the target is a group.

“If someone says that Josh is a Jewish so-and-so, that’s something the eSafety Commissioner can tell a platform to take down,” he said.

“But if someone just says something about Jewish people more broadly, there is no remit for any intervention. There needs to be somewhere for people to turn if the platforms fail to act — which inevitably they will.”

He is scathing about the social media platforms themselves.

“Clearly the platforms are woeful at tackling antisemitism and hate,” he said. “They bear so much responsibility, and yet do so little about it. I don’t think we can wait for them to take action.”

Asked what the Commission could realistically achieve, Burns pointed to Bondi and to the daily reality of Jewish life now under examination.

He also noted the abuse aimed at the Commission’s own witnesses. The goal, he said, is a return to normal communal life.

“No one wants to go to an event behind a police guard,” he said.

“People want to go to events feeling free and welcome and happy. All people want to do is just be Jewish and Australian, and practise their Jewish identity and religion freely, as this country promised and has always enabled.”

Burns has indicated he would be willing to appear before the Commission as a witness.

Josh Burns’s full submission to the Royal Commission on Antisemitism and Social Cohesion can be read here.