NGO Monitor slams Amnesty over antisemitism stance
International watchdog says human rights group opposed measures to protect Jews.
Amnesty International Australia has been accused of consistently opposing measures designed to protect Australian Jews, while failing to produce a single standalone report on antisemitism in the country between the October 7 attacks and the Bondi Beach massacre.
The international research institute, NGO Monitor, which analyses non-governmental organisations, released its report this week criticising Amnesty Australia’s advocacy campaigns against antisemitism protections.
“Despite the blatant rise in antisemitism, Amnesty International Australia, which claims to ‘challenge injustice wherever it happens,’ has consistently vilified and actively opposed measures intended to protect Australian Jews,” the report states.
NGO Monitor cited three key examples of Amnesty Australia opposing protective measures.
When Universities Australia adopted a definition of antisemitism in February 2025, Amnesty responded that the decision “is a direct attack on fundamental freedoms, stifling freedom of speech, expression, assembly, academic debate, and protest.”
Amnesty added that the definition “does nothing to uphold safety or combat discrimination and serves only to suppress student activism and restrict political expression.”
The Universities Australia definition states that criticism of the Israeli government is not in itself antisemitic, but can be antisemitic “when it is grounded in harmful tropes, stereotypes or assumptions and when it calls for the elimination of the State of Israel or all Jews or when it holds Jewish individuals or communities responsible for Israel’s actions.”
Following a surge of attacks on synagogues, including firebombs, rock throwing, bomb threats, vandalism and threatening protests, the NSW Government passed legislation in February 2025 restricting protests near houses of worship.
Amnesty labelled the law “misguided,” with Amnesty International Australia Strategic Campaigner Nikita White stating, “Criminalising peaceful protest is not a solution to tackling antisemitism, Islamophobia and racism – – it is a dangerous suppression of people’s human rights.”
When Australia’s Special Envoy to Combat Antisemitism Jillian Segal published her Plan to Combat Antisemitism in July 2025, Amnesty’s Occupied Palestinian Territory Spokesperson Mohamed Duar called it “an outrageous and blatant act of repression designed to stifle demands for human rights for Palestinians enduring genocide, occupation and apartheid.”
“This dangerous plan is designed not to protect communities, but to shield Israel from criticism,” Duar said.
NGO Monitor noted that the only reference to antisemitism it could find from Amnesty Australia between October 7, 2023 and the Bondi massacre was “a feeble, watered-down January 22, 2025 statement” that Amnesty co-signed, which referenced “escalating hate crimes on the Jewish community and on the Muslim, Arab, and Palestinian communities in Australia.”
The report highlighted Executive Council of Australian Jewry data showing a sharp increase in both the total number and severity of antisemitic incidents in Australia.
NSW Police recorded 367 antisemitic incidents between October 11, 2023 and March 26, 2025, compared with 38 classified as Islamophobic.
NGO Monitor said Amnesty Australia’s stance “reflects and continues longstanding Amnesty International practices in other countries, and the NGO’s myriad public advocacy campaigns that trade in antisemitic tropes and contribute to Jew-hatred around the world.”
Amnesty Australia has been contacted for comment and say they will respond shortly.
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