Alex Dafner:The Gandel family has funded the William Cooper Scholarship program for Aboriginal Students " 16.12.2018

Australian Jewish leaders and community were optimistic regarding a report that the Australian Government would recognise Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, a report tempered by subsequent statements by the Prime Minister Scott Morrison, but in either case precluding the shifting of the Australian embassy from Tel-Aviv to Jerusalem, due to the high costs such a move would entail. Australia was among the majority of nations that voted in favour of a UN General Assembly Resolution, which condemned Hamas for its attacks on Israel and the Foreign Minister Marise Payne and Prime Minister Scott Morrison strongly criticised Hamas for being a terrorist organisation and the UN for its gross bias against Israel. A granddaughter of a Sydney couple who was seven months pregnant, was shot while waiting at a bus stop with her husband, in Ofra on the West Bank and barely survived the subsequent operation and cesarean birth, although the prem baby died a few days later. A controversial academic from the Uni of Sydney, Dr Tim Anderson, who frequently accuses Israel of genocide and other crimes, may face termination of his position for having distributed and posted learning materials that included an image of the Israeli flag with a swastika superimposed on it. Posters claiming to belong to the Antipodean Resistance group, featuring Nazi era images with references to the C21 Hitler Youth and calling for “joining the fight”, were stuck to poles in Williamstown, west side of Melbourne, in what is seen as an emboldened increase of such activities by the Neo-Nazi and White Supremacist group. Controversy over Sydney’s Moriah College’s confirmation of its policy, to only accept students deemed to be Jewish according to the Orthodox Halachic rules, continued this week following their rejection of a daughter of a former student whose mother-in-law converted to Judaism via the progressive-reform Temple Emanuel process. The Gandel family has funded the William Cooper Scholarship program for Aboriginal Students at Monash University, in honour of the Aboriginal Yorta-Yorta and Human Rights activist, who led a protest march to the German Consulate in Melbourne in 1938, to protest the Kristallnacht pogrom against Jews in Germany and Austria, a march that was re-enacted on the 6th December in the City with the participation of Jewish and Aboriginal leaders and community members.

Source: SBS