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Shock Poll: Does the Silent Majority in Australia — and Beyond — Actually Exist?
Car in New South Wales, Australia graffitied with antisemitic message. The word “F***” has been removed from this image. Photo: Screenshot
On July 29, 2025, a national poll in Australia delivered a deeply unsettling message: perhaps the “silent majority” that we believed in for so long — those decent, fair-minded Australians who would reject antisemitism when it crossed a line — was never really there to begin with.
The survey revealed that just 24% of Australians hold a positive view of Jews, while 28% express negative views, and the rest are indifferent or unsure.
This is not the fringe — it is the center. And it lands after two years of unrelenting escalation, during which antisemitic incidents in Australia have surged by over 300%. Synagogues have been firebombed. Jewish businesses have been attacked. Marches in our cities have featured chants glorifying terror and calling for the annihilation of the Jewish State.
For the past two years, we’ve watched the unthinkable become normalized — and still, the silence has persisted. We reassured ourselves that when things got bad, or worse, Australians — quiet, pragmatic, egalitarian — would draw a line. We believed that behind the chaos of social media and the radicalism of campus protests, there was a steady, principled middle who would never let hate take hold. But perhaps we were wrong. Or perhaps we simply misread the signs.
We saw moments that encouraged hope: political leaders condemning antisemitism after high-profile incidents; universities adopting or referencing definitions of antisemitism — though often watered down, selectively applied, or lacking enforcement; and a few faith and community leaders standing shoulder to shoulder with Jewish communities in symbolic gestures of unity. We mistook these signals as proof that the mainstream was with us — that the loudest voices did not represent the majority.
But those signs were often just that — symbolic. Many condemnations were performative. Institutional policies were rarely enforced. And while we heard reassurances from officials that “most Australians reject hate,” we now know they didn’t have the data to back it up.
So why did we believe?
The truth is that the idea of a silent majority is emotionally powerful. It reassures us that we are not alone. It suggests that while antisemitism may be loud, decency is quietly stronger. It gives us permission to believe in the goodness of our neighbors, even when the evidence is thin. It tells us that democracy will self-correct, that morality will prevail in the end.
But increasingly, that belief feels more like a coping mechanism than a reality. We’ve clung to it without data, without proof, and — if we’re honest — without election results to support it. Because the alternative is terrifying: the alternative is that the center is not asleep, but absent.
And if the silent majority doesn’t exist — if it never did — what then?
It means that antisemitism isn’t just being ignored; it’s being tolerated. It means that when politicians offer symbolic recognition of a Palestinian state while Hamas still holds hostages and preaches genocide, they are not defying their electorate — they may be reflecting it. It means that when university encampments promote terror and intimidate Jewish students, and administrators do nothing, it’s not cowardice — it may be calculated silence. It means that we are not surrounded by quiet allies, but by people who either don’t care or don’t know.
It also means that we can no longer wait for “them” to speak up.
This isn’t just happening in Australia. Across the Western world, the same pattern is emerging. In Canada, antisemitism on campuses is surging, and the government now flirts with symbolic recognition of a Palestinian state — not as part of peace negotiations, but as a political signal. In Ireland, Spain, Norway, and the UK, similar moves have rewarded those who glorify terror while ignoring those who seek dialogue. In the United States, antisemitism reached record highs last year, with Jewish students and communities increasingly ostracized for daring to speak the truth.
These are not isolated developments — they are part of a deeper pattern: the moral center is shrinking, and the hateful fringes are being normalized.
At StandWithUs Australia, we fight back with facts, with education, and with pride. We equip students and communities to speak up for truth, to push back against hatred. But we cannot do this alone. We are a small community. And now, more than ever, we need others to stand publicly — not silently — with us.
Because if the silent majority was ever real, now is the time to speak. And if it remains silent now, then we must confront the hardest truth of all: that it was never there to begin with.
In that case, the path forward changes.
We must stop seeking quiet affirmation and instead build loud, unignorable support. We must shift from trusting that others will step up, to ensuring that we are strong enough to lead. We must teach, advocate, organize, and call out moral cowardice for what it is — whether it comes from universities, governments, media, or community leaders.
Because if we’ve learned anything from the past two years, it’s that silence isn’t safety.
And comfort, no matter how convincing, is not the same as courage.
Michael Gencher is executive director StandWithUs Australia, an international nonpartisan education organization that supports Israel and fights antisemitism.
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Security Warning to Israelis Vacationing Abroad Ahead of holidays
A passenger arrives to a terminal at Ben Gurion international airport before Israel bans international flights, January 25, 2021. REUTERS/Ronen Zvulun
i24 News – Ahead of the Jewish High Holidays, Israel’s National Security Council (NSC) published the latest threat assessment to Israelis abroad from terrorist groups to the public on Sunday, in order to increase the Israeli public’s awareness of the existing terrorist threats around the world and encourage individuals to take preventive action accordingly.
The NSC specified that the warning is an up-to-date reflection of the main trends in the activities of terrorist groups around the world and their impact on the level of threat posed to Israelis abroad during these times, but the travel warnings and restrictions themselves are not new.
“As the Gaza war continues and in parallel with the increasing threat of terrorism, the National Security Headquarters stated it has recognized a trend of worsening and increasing violent antisemitic incidents and escalating steps by anti-Israel groups, to the point of physically harming Israelis and Jews abroad. This is in light of, among other things, the anti-Israel narrative and the negative media campaign by pro-Palestinian elements — a trend that may encourage and motivate extremist elements to carry out terrorist activities against Israelis or Jews abroad,” the statement read.
“Therefore, the National Security Bureau is reinforcing its recommendation to the Israeli public to act with responsibility during this time when traveling abroad, to check the status of the National Security Bureau’s travel warnings (before purchasing tickets to the destination,) and to act in accordance with the travel warning recommendations and the level of risk in the country they are visiting,” it listed, adding that, as illustrated in the past year, these warnings are well-founded and reflect a tangible and valid threat potential.
The statement also emphasized the risk of sharing content on social media networks indicating current or past service in the Israeli security forces, as these posts increase the risk of being marked by various parties as a target. “Therefore, the National Security Council recommends that you do not upload to social networks, in any way, content that indicates service in the security forces, operational activity, or similar content, as well as real-time locations.”
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Israel Intensifies Gaza City Bombing as Rubio Arrives
Displaced Palestinians, fleeing northern Gaza due to an Israeli military operation, move southward after Israeli forces ordered residents of Gaza City to evacuate to the south, in the central Gaza Strip September 14, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa
Israeli forces destroyed at least 30 residential buildings in Gaza City and forced thousands of people from their homes, Palestinian officials said, as US Secretary of State Marco Rubio arrived on Sunday to discuss the future of the conflict.
Israel has said it plans to seize the city, where about a million Palestinians have been sheltering, as part of its declared aim of eliminating the terrorist group Hamas, and has intensified attacks on what it has called Hamas’ last bastion.
The group’s political leadership, which has engaged in on-and-off negotiations on a possible ceasefire and hostage release deal, was targeted by Israel in an airstrike in Doha on Tuesday in an attack that drew widespread condemnation.
Qatar will host an emergency Arab-Islamic summit on Monday to discuss the next moves. Rubio said Washington wanted to talk about how to free the 48 hostages – of whom 20 are believed to be still alive – still held by Hamas in Gaza and rebuild the coastal strip.
“What’s happened, has happened,” he said. “We’re gonna meet with them (the Israeli leadership). We’re gonna talk about what the future holds,” Rubio said before heading to Israel where he will stay until Tuesday.
ABRAHAM ACCORDS AT RISK
He was expected to visit the Western Wall Jewish prayer site in Jerusalem on Sunday with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and hold talks with him during the visit.
US officials described Tuesday’s strike on the territory of a close US ally as a unilateral escalation that did not serve American or Israeli interests. Rubio and US President Donald Trump both met Qatar’s Prime Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani on Friday.
Netanyahu signed an agreement on Thursday to push ahead with a settlement expansion plan that would cut across West Bank land that the Palestinians seek for a state – a move the United Arab Emirates warned would undermine the US-brokered Abraham accords that normalized UAE relations with Israel.
Israel, which blocked all food from entering Gaza for 11 weeks earlier this year, has been allowing more aid into the enclave since late July to prevent further food shortages, though the United Nations says far more is needed.
It says it wants civilians to leave Gaza City before it sends more ground forces in. Tens of thousands of people are estimated to have left but hundreds of thousands remain in the area. Hamas has called on people not to leave.
Israeli army forces have been operating inside at least four eastern suburbs for weeks, turning most of at least three of them into wastelands. It is closing in on the center and the western areas of the territory, where most of the displaced people are taking shelter.
Many are reluctant to leave, saying there is not enough space or safety in the south, where Israel has told them to go to what it has designated as a humanitarian zone.
Some say they cannot afford to leave while others say they were hoping the Arab leaders meeting on Monday in Qatar would pressure Israel to scrap its planned offensive.
“The bombardment intensified everywhere and we took down the tents, more than twenty families, we do not know where to go,” said Musbah Al-Kafarna, displaced in Gaza City.
Israel said it had completed five waves of air strikes on Gaza City over the past week, targeting more than 500 sites, including Hamas reconnaissance and sniper sites, buildings containing tunnel openings and weapons depots.
Local officials, who do not distinguish between militant and civilian casualties, say at least 40 people were killed by Israeli fire across the enclave, a least 28 in Gaza City alone.
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Turkey Warns of Escalation as Israel Expands Strikes Beyond Gaza
Turkey’s President Tayyip Erdogan speaks during a press conference with Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis (not seen) at the Presidential Palace in Ankara, Turkey, May 13, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Umit Bektas
i24 News – An Israeli strike targeting Hamas officials in Qatar has sparked unease among several Middle Eastern countries that host leaders of the group, with Turkey among the most alarmed.
Officials in Ankara are increasingly worried about how far Israel might go in pursuing those it holds responsible for the October 7 attacks.
Israel’s prime minister effectively acknowledged that the Qatar operation failed to eliminate the Hamas leadership, while stressing the broader point the strike was meant to make: “They enjoy no immunity,” the government said.
On X, Prime Minister Netanyahu went further, writing that “the elimination of Hamas leaders would put an end to the war.”
A senior Turkish official, speaking on condition of anonymity, summed up Ankara’s reaction: “The attack in Qatar showed that the Israeli government is ready to do anything.”
Legally and diplomatically, Turkey occupies a delicate position. As a NATO member, any military operation or targeted killing on its soil could inflame tensions within the alliance and challenge mutual security commitments.
Analysts caution, however, that Israel could opt for covert measures, operations carried out without public acknowledgement, a prospect that has increased anxiety in governments across the region.
Israeli officials remain defiant. In an interview with Ynet, Minister Ze’ev Elkin said: “As long as we have not stopped them, we will pursue them everywhere in the world and settle our accounts with them.” The episode underscores growing fears that efforts to hunt Hamas figures beyond Gaza could widen regional friction and complicate diplomatic relationships.