The Australasian Union of Jewish Students (AUJS) is a federation of Jewish student societies at Australian and New Zealand universities and other higher education institutions. It was founded in 1948 at the University of Sydney and is affiliated with the World Union of Jewish Students. AUJS' constitution lists its four pillars as Judaism, activism, Zionism, and pluralism. AUJS runs social, educational, political and religious events on University campuses.
The history of Jews in Australia traces the history of Australian Jews from the British settlement of Australia commencing in 1788. Though Europeans had visited Australia before 1788, there is no evidence of any Jewish sailors among the crew. The first Jews known to have come to Australia came as convicts transported to Botany Bay in 1788 aboard the First Fleet that established the first European settlement on the continent, on the site of present-day Sydney.
Judaism is a minority religion in Australia. 99,956 Australians identified as Jewish in the 2021 census, which accounts for about 0.4% of the population. This is a 9.8% increase in numbers from the 2016 census.
The Melbourne Hebrew Congregation, or Toorak Shule, is the oldest Jewish congregation in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. Formed in 1841, the congregation was originally located on Bourke Street before moving in 1930 to Toorak Road, South Yarra.
Australian Jews, or Jewish Australians, are Jews who are Australian citizens or permanent residents of Australia. In the 2016 census, there were 21,175 Australians who identified as Jewish by ancestry, a decrease from 25,716 in the 2011 census, and 91,016 Australians who identified as adherents of Judaism, which is a 6% decrease on 97,355 adherents of Judaism in the 2011 census. The actual number is almost certainly higher, because being a Jew is not just about being religious, but the census data is based on religious affiliation, so secular Jews often feel it would be inaccurate to answer with "Judaism". Also, since the question is optional, many practicing Holocaust survivors and Haredi Jews are believed to prefer not to disclose their religion in the census. By comparison, the Israeli newspaper Haaretz estimated a Jewish-Australian population of 120,000-150,000, while other estimates based on the death rate in the community estimate the size of the community as 250,000. Based on the census data, Jewish citizens make up about 0.4% of the Australian population. The Jewish community of Australia is composed mostly of Ashkenazi Jews, though there are Jews in Australia from many other traditions and levels of religious observance and participation in the Jewish community.
Rabbi Mordechai Zev Gutnick is a prominent Orthodox Jewish rabbi in Australia. Gutnick has served as a member of rabbinical courts in Melbourne and Sydney and various Australian rabbinical associations. He is associated with the Chabad-Lubavitch Hasidic movement; he is the eldest son of the late Rabbi Chaim Gutnick.
The Australian Jewish Democratic Society (AJDS), a secular organisation, was formed in Melbourne, Australia, in 1984 to promote free discussion and action on Jewish and general social and political issues. It grew out of a profound concern at the continuing Arab–Israeli conflict, though some of its members had been active on the left since at least the 1930s in Europe. Others had been born in Israel or Australia, or spent considerable time in Israel. Others came out of the anti-Vietnam war and peace movements. Some key members had strong links to the Israeli peace movement, the Jewish left, Labor Zionism, or other Jewish religious and cultural traditions. More recently, members with strong environmental concerns have become active.
The East Melbourne Hebrew Congregation, also known as East Melbourne Shule, East Melbourne Synagogue, Melbourne City Synagogue or City of Melbourne Synagogue is a historically significant Jewish congregation in East Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. The synagogue, consecrated in 1877, is the oldest in Melbourne.
Mendel Balberyszski was a Lithuanian Jew, Polish politician and survivor of the Holocaust in Lithuania. He is chiefly known today as the biographer of the destruction of the Vilna Ghetto in his book Stronger Than Iron – The Destruction of Vilna Jewry 1941-1945: An Eyewitness Account. It is the account of life and organization in the Small Ghetto from its day of formation until its liquidation, it is also the only complete historical record of the fate of the Jewish population of Vilna from the day of the arrival of the Germans, through the two Ghettos, the concentration camps in Estonia until the liberation of the surviving 84 Jews by the Soviet Army.
The Executive Council of Australian Jewry, or ECAJ, is an official peak national body representing the Australian Jewish community. It is the umbrella organisation for over 200 Jewish organisations across Australia. It is the Australian affiliate of the World Jewish Congress, the worldwide umbrella organisation of Jewish communities. It is also affiliated with the Commonwealth Jewish Council, the Euro-Asian Jewish Congress, the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany, and the Memorial Foundation for Jewish Culture.
Janina "Nina" Bassat is a leader in the Victorian Jewish community. She served as president of the Jewish Community Council of Victoria (JCCV) between 1996 and 1998. Then she was again president for three years before retiring again in 2014. She has also served as president of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ) between 1999 and 2001.
The Australian Jewish community has only one major hard copy weekly publication, The Australian Jewish News, but has a long history of boutique publications and zines. With the advent of the internet, blogs and online magazines have proliferated reflecting the community's multitudinous religious, political, and cultural orientations.
Yehoram Ulman is a rabbi in Sydney, Australia. He was born in Leningrad, USSR in 1964. He holds a number of senior positions in the Orthodox Jewish community.
Meir Shlomo Kluwgant is an ultra-Orthodox Chabad communal rabbi in Melbourne, Australia. He has held numerous posts including at Jewish Care, chaplain at Victoria Police, and has at various times held the presidency of both the Rabbinical Council of Victoria (RCV) and the Organisation of Rabbis of Australia (ORA).
Rabbi Yaakov Glasman is a rabbi and communal leader in the Jewish community of Melbourne, Australia.
The Lauderdale Road Spanish & Portuguese Synagogue is a synagogue in Maida Vale on Lauderdale Road in West London. It is the community hub of the S&P Sephardi Community also known as Qahal Qadosh Shaar Shamayim which is Britain's oldest Jewish community and largest of Sephardi origin which also operates Bevis Marks Synagogue and Holland Park Synagogue.
The South African Union for Progressive Judaism (SAUPJ) is an affiliate of the World Union for Progressive Judaism and supports 11 progressive congregations. Rabbi Moses Cyrus Weiler, a founder of Reform Judaism in the country, led the country's first Reform synagogue, Temple Israel in Hillbrow, Johannesburg. Weiler is credited with growing the movement, to represent 15-17% of South African Jewry and establishing 25 congregations in the country. A 2020 joint study by the Institute for Jewish Policy Research and the University of Cape Town showed that 12% of Jews identified as Progressive and that in relative terms the progressive strands are increasing after falling to 7% in 1998 and 2005 studies. In Johannesburg, the community accounts for 7% of the city's Jewry, rising to 18% in Cape Town and 25% in Durban.
Hilary L. Rubinstein is an Australian historian and author. She researches and writes on British naval history and modern Jewish history.
