New South Wales Multiculturalism Minister visits Newtown, Australia Synagogue

by Ilan Harris

Last year, seventy-seven years after the end of the Holocaust, the New South Wales Government banned the public display of Nazi symbolism outside of traditional cultural use. This new addition to the Crimes Act (1900) is a source of pride for NSW Multiculturalism Minister Mark Coure, who visited Newtown Synagogue last Friday.

Speaking at the time of the ban, Minister Coure stated “This Bill shows that our Government stands against the Nazi symbol and the hateful ideology it represents,” a sentiment echoed in his speech.

Minister Coure also expressed his disappointment that such a law had not previously been created in the decades since the holocaust, and of the hard work by communities and by government to orchestrate it.

His first time attending a synagogue service, the minister addressed the congregation from the Bimah, gesturing more moderately than Rabbi Eli Feldman who spoke before him, but with similar conviction.

Minister Coure took effort to focus his delivery to as many sections of the audience as possible, directing his view from the Rabbi, to the men’s section, and up into the lofty womens section of Sydney’s second-oldest Orthodox synagogue, to make his speech engaging to an audience of predominantly University students eager for the shabbat dinner at the end of the service.

Newtown Shul will be hosting another important delegation this weekend, with prominent visiting Indigenous Canadian elders as guests of honor at Shabbat Dinner. To register: www.Shul.org.au

Note: Pictures were taken prior to the commencement of Shabbat