Caravan incident exposes ‘dangerous failings’
Alex Ryvchin called on authorities to "do better" by making statements that "ease the crisis".
Executive Council of Australian Jewry co-CEO Alex Ryvchin has slammed authorities for being “reckless and irresponsible” after the Dural caravan incident was ruled an elaborate “hoax” before the investigation has even concluded.
Alleged mastermind Sayet Erhan Akca, 35, is now a high-level suspect for the joint counterterrorism task force investigating the caravan plot and a spate of other vile antisemitic attacks across Sydney. He was allegedly hoping to leverage a lenient court outcome by providing information about the fabricated plan to police.
Akca has been in Asia and Turkey since police say he hid in a boat to flee the country in mid-2023.
Despite police downplaying claims Akca was not motivated by antisemitism, he reportedly posted a series of antisemitic and anti-Israel slurs over a period of many years. In one post he claims, “Hitler was only washing earth, they made him out to be evil.”
In 2018 he posted: “How did 6 million die when only 3.2 registered Jews in Europe at the time?”
Ryvchin said the revelation that the alleged mastermind behind the attacks targeting the Jewish community has a long history of extreme antisemitic views “does not surprise our community in the least”.
“But it has exposed dangerous failings by authorities, political leaders and public figures who chose to characterise the firebombings that hit Jewish targets as a hoax or con-job unconnected to antisemitic ideology and to do so before the investigation had been concluded. This was reckless and irresponsible,” said Ryvchin.
“In some instances, they may have been trying to calm the community by downplaying or dismissing antisemitism as a motivating factor, but the effect was the exact opposite.
“It set off a deluge of antisemitic conspiracy theories about ‘inside jobs’, and increased harassment and vilification of Jews. It also enabled some to pursue their self-serving agenda, ranging from shutting down discussion of the antisemitism crisis to undermining law reform and settling scores with political opponents.”
Ryvchin called on authorities to “do better” by making statements that “ease the crisis” instead of contributing to it.
It comes as NSW Jewish Board of Deputies David Ossip has slammed calls for a state parliamentary inquiry into the caravan plot.
“An inquiry at this stage would merely provide a platform for hostile actors like the Greens party – which has itself been tainted by antisemitism – to gaslight and diminish the seriousness of what the Jewish community has had to deal with in recent months,” said Ossip.
But Opposition Leader Mark Speakman backed the parliamentary inquiry, saying NSW Premier Chris Minns and Police Minister Yasmin Catley should be made to disclose when they were briefed that the caravan incident “was a fake terrorism plot”.
“The opposition will support a move for a parliamentary inquiry to ensure transparency and accountability,” said Speakman.
“This issue can’t be swept under the rug.” During Parliament on Tuesday Minns said the “threat was real” to the Jewish community despite the incident and others allegedly being organised by criminal syndicates, adding that he was “briefed early that this could be something other than terrorism as it’s classically defined”.
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