History of the Jews in Australia

97,335 Australian residents identified themselves as Jewish by religion in the 2011 census, but the actual number was estimated to be 112,000 (An answer to the question on the census was optional). In the 2021 census 99,956 residents identified themselves as religious Jews, but in the same census only 29,115 identified themselves as Jewish by preferred ancestry, so the number of Jewish Australians simply is not known. Given more than two centuries of Jewish migration to Australia and the extent of moving away from or marrying out of Judaism, as many as 250,000 Australian residents may have Jewish ancestries. The majority are Ashkenazi Jews, many of them Jewish refugees, including Holocaust survivors, who arrived during and after World War II, and their descendants. Jews make up about 0.5% of the Australian population.

History

Major general histories of the Jews in Australia are Hilary L. Rubinstein and William D. Rubinstein, The Jews in Australia: A Thematic History (2 vols., 1991) and Suzanne D. Rutland, Edge of the Diaspora: Two Centuries of Jewish Settlement in Australia (2001; first ed. 1988). Each of these academic historians has written more concise general histories also, with Hilary L. Rubinstein's Chosen: The Jews in Australia (1987) being the first overall history of Australian Jewry, and described by Rabbi Raymond Apple as skilfully and stylishly weaving together the strands of the story of a colourful minority group and its interaction with general society. Rabbi John Simon Levi, co-author of Australian Genesis: Jewish Convicts and Settlers, 1788-1850 (1974) has authored the magisterial biographical directory, These Are The Names: Jewish Lives in Australia, 1788-1860 (2013). The Australian Jewish Historical Society Journal (started 1939) appears twice a year, published in Sydney and Melbourne respectively. There are also a number of published monographs on aspects of Australian Jewish history, for a guide to which (as well as to Australian Jewish literature) Serge Liberman, A Bibliography of Australasian Judaica, 1788-2008 (2011) is a distinguished reference work.

Colonial era

Australian Jews never constituted more than 1% of the total colonial community. Eight convicts transported to Botany Bay in 1788 aboard the First Fleet have been identified as Jewish. There were probably more, but exact numbers are not possible as the transportation records did not indicate a convict's religion. Over a thousand more people of Jewish descent are estimated to have been sent to Australia as convicts during the next 60 years. Most of them came from London, were of working-class background and were male. Only 7% of Jewish convicts were female, compared to 15% for non-Jewish convicts. The average age of the Jewish convicts was 25, but ranged as young as 8 to some elderly people. Esther Abrahams (who arrived with the First Fleet, with her baby daughter Roseanna) and Ikey Solomon were among the convicts who were Jewish.

At first, the Church of England was the established religion in the colony, and during the early years of transportation all convicts were required to attend Anglican services on Sundays. This included Irish Catholics as well as Jews. Similarly, education in the new settlement was Anglican church-controlled until the 1840s.

The first move towards organisation in the community was the formation of a Chevra Kadisha (a Jewish burial society) in Sydney in 1817. In 1820, William Cowper allotted land for the establishment of a Jewish cemetery in the right-hand corner of the then-Christian cemetery. The Jewish section was created to enable the burial of one Joel Joseph. During the next ten years there was no great increase in membership of the society, and its services were not called for more than once a year. The actual allocation of land for a consecrated Jewish cemetery was not approved until 1832.

The first Jewish services in the colony were conducted from 1820 in private homes by emancipist Joseph Marcus, one of the few convicts with Jewish knowledge. An account of the period stated:

In 1827 and 1828 then the worldly condition of the Hebrews in the colony improved considerably, in consequence of the great influx of respectable merchants; and this, with other circumstances, has raised the Hebrews in the estimation of their fellow colonists. About this period P. J. Cohen having offered the use of his house for the purpose, divine worship was performed for the first time in the colony according to the Hebrew form, and was continued regularly every Sabbath and holiday. From some difference of opinion then existing among the members of this faith, divine service was also performed occasionally in a room hired by Messrs. A. Elias and James Simmons. In this condition everything in connection with their religion remained until the arrival of Rev. Aaron Levi, in the year 1830. He had been a dayyan, and, duly accredited, he succeeded in instilling into the minds of the congregation a taste for the religion of their fathers. A Sefer Torah [scroll of the Law] was purchased by subscription, divine service was more regularly conducted, and from this time may be dated the establishment of the Jewish religion in Sydney. In 1832 they formed themselves into a proper congregation, and appointed Joseph Barrow Montefiore as the first president.

In 1830 or 1832, the first Jewish wedding in Australia was celebrated, the contracting parties being Moses Joseph and Rosetta Nathan. Three years later a Mr Rose came from England and acted as the chazzan, shochet, and mohel. He was succeeded by Jacob Isaacs.

Over the following decades, the community's numbers increased, primarily as a result of Jewish immigration from the United Kingdom and Germany. Kehillas (organized communities) began to be established in Sydney (1831) and Melbourne (1841). The condition of the Jewish community improved to such an extent that in 1844 the first synagogue was formed in York Street, Sydney using rented space, which continued in use for more than thirty years.

The 1841 census shows that New South Wales Jewry accounted for 65.3% of the total Australian Jewish population, and 0.57% of the total Australian population. In 1848, there were 200 Jews in Victoria, and they formed the Melbourne Jewish Philanthropic Society to provide assistance to those in need.

Although the Jewish community was primarily Ashkenazi, some Sephardi Jews also immigrated to Australia, and the community thrived during the mid-to-late 19th century. For some twenty years, there was a Sephardic congregation, and some Sephardi families occupied important communal positions. Gradually, however, the Sephardi population declined, and the congregation was disbanded in 1873.

The gold rush of the 1850s attracted a wave of immigrants, and Jewish immigrants soon outnumbered native-born Jews. Initially, they settled in rural areas, but by the end of the 19th century the lack of Jewish communal connections and fear of assimilation led most Australian Jews in rural areas to relocate to the Jewish centres in cities. As a result, the rapidly growing community in Sydney needed larger facilities, and built the Great Synagogue, located on Elizabeth Street, opposite Hyde Park, which was consecrated in 1878.

When Queensland separated from New South Wales in 1859, Jewish people began to settle in Brisbane, forming the Brisbane Hebrew Congregation in 1865. The congregation used a number of venues as temporary places of worship, including a building in the grounds of Samuel Davis's home at North Quay (the house later known as Aubigny), while raising money through various land speculations to purchase a site and build a synagogue. They purchased land in Margaret Street for £200 and in 1885 called for designs, choosing the plans of Arthur Morry, an architect who worked for the Queensland Colonial Architect. Arthur Midson, a prominent Brisbane building contractor, built the Synagogue for the sum of £6450. The Brisbane Synagogue was consecrated on 18 July 1886, its spiritual name being "Kehilla Kedosha Sha'ari Emuna" (The Holy Congregation of the Gates of Faith).

The Jewish press in Australia was pioneered in Melbourne. In 1895, Sydney's first Jewish newspaper, called the Hebrew Standard of Australasia, was published, and is the forerunner of The Australian Jewish News.

At the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th, as Australia was unifying its colonies into a single independent country, a new wave of Jewish immigration began. Jewish refugees from Russia and Poland began arriving in the 1890s, fleeing pogroms in their native lands. This immigration wave led to a divide among urban Jewish communities. Most Jews in Sydney were from Western and Central Europe, and were largely secular. Meanwhile, Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe settled in Melbourne, and were highly Orthodox. In addition, thousands of highly observant Jews immigrated from South Africa and settled in Perth.

Jews also began to assemble in Melbourne, then in the Port Phillip District (now Victoria). The Melbourne Hebrew Congregation was formed in 1841, and the first synagogue building opened in 1847 at 472 Bourke Street, with a seating capacity of 100. Other synagogues were built in Hobart (1845), Launceston (1846) and Adelaide (1850).

With the arrival of large numbers of immigrants in the 1850s, especially during the Victorian Gold Rush, there was a need for a larger synagogue in Melbourne. Construction of a larger 600 seat synagogue at South Yarra commenced in March 1855. Other Jewish congregations were formed in Geelong, Bendigo, and Ballarat (1853). The East Melbourne Hebrew Congregation split from the Bourke St congregation in 1857. The St Kilda Hebrew Congregation was formed in 1871, with the first services held in St Kilda Town Hall and the building of a permanent building in Charnwood Road, St Kilda, commencing in 1872. Since the 1850s, Melbourne has had the largest Jewish population in the country. A religious court (Beth Din) was set up in Melbourne in 1866.

20th century

By 1901 it is estimated there were over 15,000 Jews in Australia. When Australia federated in 1901, some of the founders were Jewish. From the outset, Jews were treated as equal citizens with freedom to participate in economic and cultural life, and played an important role in their development. Antisemitism, which was common in contemporary Europe, was very rare in Australia.

Following World War I, another stream of Jewish immigrants came including Russian and Polish Jewish refugees, and when the Nazis took power in Germany in 1933, many German Jews came to Australia. The Australian government was initially hesitant in permitting entry to the many Jews who wanted to come, but in 1938, it allotted 15,000 visas for "victims of oppression". Some 7,000 Jews were able to take up the visas before the outbreak of World War II put an end to the program.

With the outbreak of World War II, the Australian government instituted a policy of interning German nationals, termed enemy aliens, including refugees from Nazism. Among these were Jews who had German passports, such as sculptor Karl Duldig and artist and inventor Slawa Duldig and their two-year-old daughter Eva. They were sent, with nearly 300 other internees to isolated Tatura Internment Camp 3 D near Shepparton, in northern Victoria. There, armed soldiers manned watchtowers and scanned the camp that was bordered by a barbed wire fence with searchlights, and other armed soldiers patrolled the camp. Petitions to Australian politicians, stressing that they were Jewish refugees and therefore being unjustly imprisoned, had no effect. They remained in the internment camp until 1942, when the father enlisted in the Australian Army. Their daughter, Eva Duldig, was years later a top tennis player for Australia.

Organisations during WWII tried to help children affected by the war by bringing them to Australia but were only able to after the war ended. During WWII transportation for civilians was limited, so no Jewish orphans could be brought over even though the Australian government increased their allowance quota for orphaned children. After the war, the pre-war anti-Jewish refugee sentiment influenced the government's choice not to fund any Jewish immigration, saying it was the Jewish community's responsibility to bring over the refugees. This made it so sponsors and organisations were the ones to help fund the Jewish refugee's journey and settlement into the Australia Jewish community.

In the aftermath of World War II Australia abandoned its previous Anglo-centric immigration policy and permitted immigration of large numbers of people from continental Europe. Many European Jews, survivors of the Holocaust, arrived in the country from displaced persons camps, but there were instances of antisemitism. For example, K. M. Bolton of the Returned Services League tried to encourage the government and the immigration Minister Arthur A. Calwell to stem the flow of displaced persons, and other groups published cartoons opposing immigration of Jews.

From 1938 to 1961 the Jewish population almost tripled in size from the 1933 population to 61,000 Jews living in Australia. Organisations during the war tried to bring over and place children affected by the war, but were only able to after the war ended. Two organisations assisting with the immigration, specifically of orphaned children were Save the Children’s Scheme and the Jewish Welfare Guardian Scheme, who brought over a total of 317 orphaned Jewish children from Europe in the years after the war. The girls brought over were placed into orphanages, while the boys were placed into hostels, where they lived with other holocaust survivors.

In 1940 there were 2,500 German and Austrian refugee internees including 1,750 Jewish refugees, known as the Dunera internees, were all immediately sent to an internment camp in Hay, New South Wales. A large number of the new immigrants were observant Jews, and day-school attendance rose steadily. A new Sephardic community also emerged in the post-war period. Previously, Mizrahi Jews were generally not permitted to enter due to Australia's White Australia policy. However, following the Suez Crisis in 1956, a number of Egyptian Jews were allowed to enter. Over the following years, overtures from Jewish communities led the government to drop its previous stance on entry of Mizrahi Jews. By 1969, when Iraqi Jews were being persecuted, the government granted refugee status to Iraqi Jews who managed to reach Australia.

In the 1970s, the Australian Jewish community was concerned by the rising intermarriage rate which impacted the numbers of Jews with bonds to the community. By the early 1980s, intermarriage again dropped to one of the lowest rates in the diaspora. The community was further bolstered by immigration from South Africa, and starting in 1989, from the former Soviet Union.

Throughout the 20th century, many Jews served as elected officials. Among the positions held by Jews were five mayors of Adelaide, at least two of Melbourne, and a similar number in Sydney, a premier of South Australia, speaker of the House of Representatives, and speaker of Parliament. Many Jewish elected officials simultaneously served as the heads of their kehillas. However, the successful integration of Jews into Australian society led to a rise in assimilation. Intermarriage rates rose, synagogue attendance dropped, and many Jews stopped practising Judaism altogether. However, there were still many who chose to remain observant.

Recent history

JewishCare is among Australia's largest and oldest Jewish aid organisations, started in 1935 as the Australian Jewish Welfare Society to assist with Jewish migration from Nazi Germany. It is still engaged in assisting migrants and providing other welfare services.

The Jewish community's Jewish Museum of Australia opened in Melbourne in 1982 and the Sydney Jewish Museum opened in 1992 to commemorate the Holocaust, as well as to "challenge visitors' perceptions of democracy, morality, social justice and human rights". There was an increase in immigration from Australia to Israel in 2010, when 240 Australians moved to Israel, up from 165 in 2009. On 30 June 2023, the Queensland Holocaust Museum and Education Centre in Brisbane opened as the first Jewish Museum in Queensland.

The government of Israel received adverse publicity with the revelation that their spies were travelling on Australian passports, either forged or borrowed from Jewish travellers, in 2003 and 2010.

On 27 November 2016, the Annual Report of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ) on antisemitism in Australia, reported that in the 12-month period ending 30 September 2016 there was a 10% increase in antisemitic incidents in Australia involving threats or acts of violence over the previous year.

There was a further uptick in antisemitic incidents, particularly in Sydney, since the protracted Israel-Gaza War and Gaza genocide after the October 7 attacks by Hamas. In January 2025 the Albanese government announced the construction of a National Holocaust Education Centre in Canberra as well as funding for an upgrade to the Holocaust Institute of Western Australia's Education Centre in the Perth suburb of Yokine, to educate schoolchildren.

On 14 December 2025, a terrorist mass shooting occurred at Bondi Beach in Sydney, in the early evening during a Hanukkah celebration attended by approximately one thousand people. Two alleged gunmen, Sajid Akram and Naveed Akram, killed 15 people, including a 10 year old child. The incident was identified as Islamic State inspired and was deliberately targeting the Hanukkah celebration.