A Reflection By Rabbi Gersh Lazarow
It’s not my nature to comment from the pulpit or from this page on political matters, whether state or federal, national or international. But this week, silence feels like complicity.
The reason I don’t usually comment on these things is because I firmly believe that the strength of our community is in its diversity. While I hold strong views and encourage others to hold theirs, we created Shtiebel to be a place where those views can be shared rather than dictated. I don’t usually speak about political matters because I see my role, and Shtiebel’s role, as creating a space where people with diverse opinions can gather and share them safely. I don’t want my voice or opinion to be louder than anyone else’s. But every now and then, something happens that shakes that balance, that demands not commentary but conscience.
The election of Zohran Mamdani as the new mayor of New York City has stirred something profound in me. On one hand, it is a triumph of democracy, a reminder that ordinary people can still bend the arc of history when united by conviction. His campaign was nothing short of remarkable—driven by optimism, conviction, and a belief that grassroots politics can still challenge entrenched power. It reflected the energy of a generation that refuses to give up on the idea that change is possible. In a time when cynicism too often wins, Mamdani’s campaign was filled with idealism and courage.
But on the other hand, it is a moment of deep unease, a sobering lesson in what happens when populism merges with moral confusion, when the slogans of progress cloak ideologies that undermine the very pluralism they claim to defend. Here is a man who proudly defines himself as an anti-Zionist, a stance that has become fashionable in activist and academic circles, where hostility to Israel has been recast as a marker of moral virtue. And now he leads the most Jewish city in the world, home to more Jews than Jerusalem itself.
Like many, I watched the sermon delivered last Shabbat by Rabbi Ammiel Hirsch of the Stephen Wise Free Synagogue. His voice, steady but pained, has echoed across the Jewish world. He posed three questions that have stayed with me: How can a man with almost no managerial experience be entrusted with one of the most complex municipal systems in the world? How can a self-described socialist be chosen to lead the greatest capitalist city the world has ever known? And most disquieting of all, how can an avowed anti-Zionist be elected to lead the city with the largest Jewish population outside of Israel?
Rabbi Hirsch did not ask these questions out of partisanship, but out of love—love for democracy, for his city, and for his people. His sermon was not a lament but a call to action—to wake up, to speak up, and to remember that freedom and decency survive only when good people refuse to look away.
To understand how we arrived here, we must look honestly at the cultural tide that has been rising for years. A generation of young people, Jewish and non-Jewish alike, has been raised in an environment where anti-Israel rhetoric has become the background noise of moral discourse. In universities, in social media feeds, and in many progressive movements, Israel has been cast as the ultimate villain, a colonial oppressor, a global pariah. This relentless distortion has worked. It has made anti-Zionism respectable and has trained many to see Jewish self-determination not as liberation, but as occupation. And slowly, tragically, it has convinced even some young Jews that to be ethical, one must disavow the very idea of a Jewish state.
At the same time, we must also acknowledge that Israel’s own domestic and military choices have contributed to this complexity. The conflict in Gaza, the anguish of Palestinian civilians, the moral exhaustion of endless war—these cannot be dismissed. Nor can we ignore the growing scourge of settler violence in the West Bank, which distorts the moral foundation on which the Jewish state was built and deepens the wounds of those already suffering.
Yet it is equally true that Palestinian and Islamic fundamentalism, with its culture of martyrdom and its calls for Israel’s destruction, has hardened hearts and polarised an already fractured society. These forces feed off one another, leaving little room for moderation or hope. The necessity of Israel’s defence is real, but so too is the human cost. If we are to speak honestly, we must hold both truths: that Israel faces existential threats requiring force, and that those actions reverberate painfully across the world. To love Israel is not to deny her imperfections, but to engage them with integrity.
These are not distant problems. The tremors of New York are felt here in Australia. Only days ago, neo-Nazis marched outside the New South Wales Parliament, chanting for the silencing of Jewish voices—an image that should chill every one of us. Their presence was not a fringe spectacle; it was a warning. That march was not simply about Jews. It was an assault on democracy itself, a test of whether the public square still belongs to all of us, or only to those loud enough, cruel enough, or unashamed enough to claim it.
When hatred seeks to silence Jews, it is never just about Jews. It is about whether society will tolerate the silencing of anyone. And so I find myself asking: how far away are we, really, from New York? How long until the rhetoric of exclusion becomes the language of policy, until the normalisation of hatred erodes the foundations of our civic life?
The real crisis of our time is not only political but spiritual. The Jewish world is fracturing under the strain of fear, anger, and ideological purity. The right dismisses critique as betrayal; the left mistakes denunciation for virtue. And in the middle, the moral and spiritual centre that has sustained us for generations is collapsing.
We are watching a community that once prided itself on argument for the sake of heaven become paralysed by argument for the sake of winning. We have replaced humility with certainty, curiosity with condemnation, and nuance with slogans. The space between conviction and compassion is shrinking, and with it, our ability to truly listen to one another. As Rabbi Jonathan Sacks wrote in The Dignity of Difference (2002):
“When we stop listening to one another, we lose the art of conversation and the ability to see the world through someone else’s eyes. And when that happens, we begin to lose our humanity.”
The wounds of this moment run deeper than politics. They touch the very heart of what it means to be a people bound together by covenant rather than conformity. If we cannot recover that moral centre—if we forget how to argue lovingly, to disagree without delegitimising—then we will have surrendered something essential: not only our unity, but our purpose.
If we are to hold this centre, we must speak with courage and compassion. We must make room for those who feel conflicted, those whose hearts ache for both Israelis and Palestinians, those who still believe in dialogue even when it feels impossible. Silence is not a strategy. Dismissiveness is not leadership. If we cannot create communities where the hard questions are asked with empathy and answered with integrity, we will lose the very people we most need to keep within the tent—our young, idealistic, justice-seeking Jews who long for a Judaism that can hold both conscience and connection.
Now is the moment to reclaim moral clarity. In our homes, let us model difficult conversations without fear. Let our children see that Judaism can hold complexity without collapsing under it. In our families, let us teach that to hold Israel to its highest ideals is an act of devotion, not distance. In our communities, let us ensure that our love of Israel and our commitment to human dignity are not seen as competing values. We can be defenders of Jewish safety and champions of justice at the same time. And when hatred rises, whether in the streets of Sydney or in the politics of New York, we must answer not with despair, but with courage. We must show up, visible and unafraid, grounded in the knowledge that Jewish resilience is not only a story of survival but of moral stubbornness—a refusal to let darkness define the narrative.
Democracy, like Judaism, demands that we live with contradiction. We can love it and fear it in the same breath. We can celebrate freedom and still mourn its consequences. We can defend Israel and still ache for peace. But we must never surrender our moral centre. Because if we allow hatred to be normalised, we risk losing not only our safety but our soul.
The lesson of New York and the warning from Sydney are the same: our silence is never neutral. If hatred can be organised, then so can hope. And that work of rebuilding trust, renewing courage, and reclaiming moral clarity begins not in someone else’s city, but in our own homes, our own hearts, and our own community.