On Emma Lazarus and Bondi Beach

This is a targeted attack on Jewish Australians on the first day of Hanukkah, which should be a day of joy,” said Anthony Albanese, the Australian prime minister.

He added: “An attack on Jewish Australians is an attack on every Australian.”

~ New York Times, December 14, 2025 (1)

To which I would add: An attack on Jewish Australians is an attack on every Jew.

A few days ago, I had one of those “I was today-years-old when I learned…” moments.

I was on the phone with a rabbi friend. This friend, like me, is a feminist, a champion of socioeconomic and racial equality, immigrant rights, LGBTQIA+ rights, science, the arts, education, and what all of these together amount to, namely, democracy.

She is also a Zionist.

Here is the thing I learned.

Surely you have heard this line:

“Until we are all free, we are none of us free.”

Well, I am loath to tell you this, but I didn’t know who wrote it, or in what context, until it came up in our conversation. If you’re also in this boat, let me enlighten you without judgment, just as my friend did for me.

Emma Lazarus, the renowned 19th-century Jewish poet, is best known for her 1883 sonnet, “The New Colossus,” source of the famous Statue of Liberty exhortation: “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.”

That same year, she also wrote the above line, which has become part of the American liberal lexicon and is often quoted in social justice circles to address collective responsibility for each other’s liberation. I hope it goes without saying that I fully ascribe to such aspirations, as is evidenced by, well, my whole life.

There is just one problem.

Maybe you can see where this is going.

That problem is that nowadays, there is too often what I think of as an invisible asterisk that whispers: Except for Jews. (2)

It’s important to understand that Lazarus’s intended audience was “the assimilated, comfortable Jews of America who were turning their backs on Jews who were being beaten, raped, and murdered in the pogroms of Eastern Europe.” (3)

In fact, Lazarus spent two years urging mutual responsibility through a weekly series of essays called “Epistles to the Hebrews,” in which she “argued for the creation of a Jewish homeland in Palestine for refugees fleeing outbreaks of antisemitism in Europe.”(4)

Emma Lazarus, who arguably gave voice to the American dream itself, wrote “Until we are all free, we are none of us free,” not about everybody else, but for other Jews.

Consider what she says after the famous part:

“Until we are all free, we are none of us free. But lest we should justify the taunts of our opponents, lest we should become ‘tribal’ and narrow and Judaic rather than humane and cosmopolitan like the anti-Semites of Germany and Jew-baiters of Russia, we ignore and repudiate our unhappy brethren as having no part or share in their misfortunes – until the cup of anguish is held also to our own lips.” (5)

Also, Lazarus “consistently put her literary reputation on the line to defend the Jewish people.” (6) When she volunteered with poor Jewish immigrants, not at all unlike my great-grandparents (though they came to NYC a quarter century or so after Lazarus’s death), she quipped, “What would my society friends say if they saw me here?” (7)

As I mentioned on Friday, I am thinking a great deal lately about assimilation – its privileges as well as its high price of admission.

Lazarus’s “joke” about what her non-Jewish friends would say if they saw her helping her fellow Jews, the ones who looked Jewish and sounded Jewish and – gasp – acted Jewish, resonates startlingly.

I see this happening today. Focusing “too much” on Jews (and presumably not enough on Palestinians) is perceived as a betrayal of progressive values. It is conflated with condoning the fascist tactics of two evil governments. It’s associated with shutting down free speech and worse. Ugh. I hate all of this.

I know that’s a simplistic thing to say, but I really do. I hate that the Jewish community (as if it is a monolith) is so fractured, and that Israeli Jews and American Jews not only speak different languages but literally live such different realities of Jewish life that we can forget our shared obligation to each other as a people. I hate that there is silence when Jews are murdered for being Jewish, whether it’s in Boulder or Bondi Beach. I hate that to speak of these things is seen as not caring about Palestinians or justice, one of the biggest lies of our times that has been repeated so often that it is accepted as fact in many circles. I hate that “justice” comes with an asterisk: *except for Jews. (8)

A week or so ago, I was browsing for Hanukkah presents in a cute store I like in Northampton, Massachusetts. A small pile of stickers sat for sale by the cash register. The sticker read: “None of us is free until all of us is free,” set against a backdrop of red flowers.

If they were anemones, they would be the national flower of Israel. If they were poppies, they would be the national flower of Palestine.

It’s so telling that these are impossible to tell apart if you’re not a botanist – not unlike so many Israelis and Palestinians themselves.

The irony of this powerful declaration – penned by a Jewish woman 142 years ago, an early pioneer of Zionism, to her fellow Jews on behalf of their Jewish brothers and sisters elsewhere in the world – being appropriated by a movement that would all but certainly have ousted Emma Lazarus from its midst, leaves me speechless. (Not to mention, does appropriation not matter if it’s Jews who are being appropriated?)

Ted Deutch, CEO of the American Jewish Committee, shared the following in a newsletter:

“I celebrated Shabbat at Bondi Beach in September during AJC’s visit to Australia. As part of that trip, together with the leadership of the Australian Jewish community, Shira Loewenberg, Director of AJC’s Asia Pacific Institute, and I warned government officials and law enforcement that their failure to take meaningful action against antisemitism could lead to more violence and bloodshed. We told them that the community was at risk and that Australia’s reputation in the United States and the world was at stake. And now here we are.” (bold mine)

You may think I am crazy drawing a parallel between a sticker in Northampton, Massachusetts, and an antisemitic-driven shooting in Australia. And believe me, I fully recognize and cringe at how the far-right has seized antisemitism as a cudgel. It leaves a Jew like me in quite a predicament, one I keep trying to thwack my way through in writing. Who knows if I’m succeeding, and if I’m failing, I’m doing so publicly. That is a risk every writer must take.

Consider that last week, Columbia University released an internal report about its findings of antisemitism on campus since October 7, 2023, (9) representative of experiences widespread among Jews not only in academia but in literary circles and social justice movements.

Consider that an organization named after the very same red anemones, symbols of resilience and hope, grew out of the ostracism that many Israeli academics have endured since October 8, 2023. (10)

Consider that when there are violent acts against Jews for being Jews, the fingers point to Israel’s actions in Gaza, and the “whataboutism” begins as if on cue. As a friend said to me on the phone this morning, “I feel like the rape victim keeps getting blamed for wearing a short skirt.” (11)

The increasing normalization of speaking of Israel as the epicenter of evil without nuance leads to violence. Period. (12)

Either the world isn’t listening, or the world doesn’t care.

I am catching myself here, because writing “the world” in that last sentence kind of jolted me. I’m leaving it in because I think it points to the very human (and perhaps very Jewish?) impulse to hole up, like a Maccabee in a cave, ready to fight.

Because on top of the grief, that’s what ignites me, that readiness. And I don’t think it’s unwarranted, to be honest. However, I am also wary – as in aware – of this urge. To be in “fight” mode makes the whole world my enemy, and that also doesn’t go well.

Writing is both how I claim my voice and how I temper it. It’s my way of coming out of the cave.

“Until we are all free, we are none of us free.”

Lazarus wrote these words to and for her fellow Jews. I write mine to and for my fellow Jews. I also write to and for anyone willing to wrestle with what the old stories tell us today about who we have been and who we are becoming.

I refuse to be an asterisk, excluded from the call for liberation that one of my ancestors wrote.

I refuse to downplay antisemitism, knowing that I cannot control how or what others think of me.

I refuse to be gaslit, shamed, or pigeonholed.

I refuse to be silent when 16 of my family members, ranging in age from 10 to 87, on the other side of the world were gunned down at what should have been a joyful community gathering at sunset.

I’ll end with these insights from Julie Gray: (13)

Antisemitism is dumb.

It’s also evil, murderous, devastating and capable of wiping out entire civilizations, but at its core, it is remarkably stupid. It’s a lazy shortcut for people who cannot or will not recognize, examine, and take responsibility for, or take action about, the systemic and structural failures of their societies.

In other words, antisemitism is the early-stage symptom of a society coming apart. When Jews are targeted, it means the political immune system has collapsed, and the societal immune system is soon to follow.

As Rabbi Jonathan Sacks put it, far better: Antisemitism tells you nothing about Jews and everything about those who hate them.

In memory of the 15 Jews who were murdered at Bondi Beach on 24 Kislev, 5786 / December 14, 2025. May their memories, like the Hanukkah candles we will light for the next eight nights, be bright lights in the darkness.