Candlelight Without Courage

When vigils replace leadership

Forgive me, Penny Wong, but I don’t feel especially moved that you attended a candle-lit vigil for the Bondi victims.

Yes, attending the vigil was, in the narrow, ceremonial sense, “the right thing to do.”

But what, exactly, did it do?

When you were in Jerusalem after the October 7 slaughter of 1200 Israelis, you declined to visit the site of the attack.

It was too far to drive.

And besides, you were busy.

Yet now, with your government’s political fortunes wobbling like a Jenga tower in an earthquake, you’ve found the time to mourn dead Jews - and to make sure everyone knows about it.

It’s all very convenient.

Am I too cynical? If I am it is only because your government trained me that way.

Cynicism is the natural response to a political class that prefers symbolism to substance every single time.

It’s all very well to attend a vigil for the dead. But it’s not the government’s role to attend funerals. It’s the government’s role to prevent funerals.

Leadership after the event is worse than useless.

Penny Wong tweeted today …

Last night I attended a vigil at St Francis Xavier in Adelaide honouring the victims of the antisemitic terror attack at Bondi.

Together, leaders from across faiths lit candles to remember the innocent lives stolen and to stand in solidarity with the Australian Jewish community.

Lives stolen?

Bondi wasn’t hit by pickpockets.

It wasn’t a tragic accident involving a ladder and bad luck.

Jews in Bondi were attacked by Islamic jihadis.

This is not a time for euphemisms, passive voice, or verbal airbrushing.

It’s a time for plain speaking - something your government treats like a communicable disease.

Which raises an awkward question. While you were lighting candles with “leaders from across faiths,” did you take a moment to tell the Islamic leader present that urgent and dramatic action is required to correct the ideas inside his own tradition that keep producing men who think murdering Jews is a religious duty?

Or was that conversation deemed too divisive for the mood lighting?

As for “solidarity” that most vacuous of terms so loved by our political elite every time jihadis shoot up the general populace … solidarity at a vigil is no substitute for moral clarity, decisive action, and accountability.

When governments tolerate extremism, minimise hate, or choose political convenience over principle, the consequences eventually land on innocent people … which is why you’re lighting a candle now.

That candle is not a sign of solidarity. It’s a symbol of failure. So forgive me for not feeling warm and fuzzy about it.

Respect for the victims requires honesty about how we got here.

Which is why Albanese’s billion-dollar gun buy-back - an exercise in national distraction if ever there was one - rings hollow.

A neat little “look over here” policy, carefully designed to avoid addressing the ideology that actually pulled the trigger.

But back to Penny Wong who was continuing to wax lyrical on Twitter …

Last night’s vigil showed that when we stand together, we are stronger than hatred.

May the light we share remind us of the hope we carry in darkness and of our resolve to reject antisemitism, terror and hatred.

We will not be divided.

Let’s break that down, shall we?

Last night’s vigil showed that when we stand together, we are stronger than hatred.

Sorry, but what does that even mean?

Did the candle vigil how that Australia is stronger than the Islamic terrorists? How? In what measurable, tangible way?

Or is this just one of those phrases politicians recite like a spell, hoping meaning will magically appear if they say it slowly enough?

If you truly wanted to stand together with Jews, you could start by implementing all of Jillian Segal’s recommendations to combat antisemitism.

But that would require effort, backbone, and the willingness to upset people who shout very loudly.

Lighting a candle is much simpler.

Then there’s this gem:

May the light we share remind us of the hope we carry in darkness and of our resolve to reject antisemitism, terror and hatred.

Are you the Foreign Minister or a contractor with Hallmark Greeting Cards?

Anyone who has been paying attention would laugh - darkly - at the suggestion, from you of all people, that there has been anything like “resolve” to combat antisemitism.

And the final part is, of course, the most self-serving of all the government’s messages at this time.

We will not be divided.

Whenever politicians say this, what they really mean is: Please stop criticising us.

Unity, in this context, is not a moral principle, it’s a gag order.

If Penny Wong was on the side of the Jewish community she would rescind recognition of the Palestinian state.

But no.

She and her colleagues reward Hamas, import ISIS brides, allow chants of “gas the Jews” at the Sydney Opera House and hand out tourist visas to thousands of Gazans.

She and her colleagues stand with the Islamists while lighting a candle for dead Jews.

The Islamists have a name for that - taqiyya.