Australian Jewish News, 5 August 2026
A focus on extremism, radicalisation and prevention
From AJN Staff
Extremism expert identifies “significant blind spot” for antisemitism
Antisemitism has become a uniquely powerful mobilising force for extremists across the political spectrum because it offers a single, all-purpose explanation for grievances, a Royal Commission on Antisemitism and Social Cohesion hearing was told this afternoon.
Dr Joshua Roose, Associate Professor of Politics at Deakin University and an expert in political and religious violent extremism, masculinities and radicalisation, told the Commission that antisemitic conspiracy theories have thrived online in a way “it couldn’t in a face-to-face environment.”
He said the narrative that a “Jewish lobby” secretly controls governments had become “a really powerful mobilising force” over the past 10 to 15 years, because it lets people attribute all their problems to a single group: “Everything that’s going wrong with my life, it’s not me, it’s not this other group, it’s the Jews”.
Asked by Commissioner Virginia Bell whether the idea was influential across the extremist spectrum, Dr Roose said antisemitism functioned as the “perfect enemy” for the far right, far left, and Islamist extremists alike.
Among Islamist communities, the belief that Jews are “mischievous” and sowing division has long circulated, amplified by online hate preachers.
On the extreme left, Zionists had become the “perfect enemy” because, he said, “there’s no diversity in this framing of what a Zionist is” — in his words, “a Zionist is a bad person who is loyal to a state that’s hurting others.”
And among conspiratorial “sovereign citizen” movements, an anti-globalist worldview holds government to be a corporation controlled by Jewish interests.
“It’s the perfect enemy across so many different layers of these ideological narratives,” he said, adding that it is ultimately “about the target”.
A ‘blind spot’ in Australia’s anti-racism frameworks
Dr Roose said there is “a significant blind spot” in Australia’s multicultural and anti-racism frameworks when it comes to identifying antisemitism, because those frameworks are built around visible disadvantage — and Jewish Australians, who statistically tend to be highly educated and comparatively well off.
He later linked the blind spot to Australian “tall poppy syndrome” — targeting people perceived to be doing well and “attempt[ing] to bring them back down” — and said Australia’s otherwise world-leading anti-racism frameworks “need work” specifically in relation to antisemitism.
Part of the problem, he said, is coded language: “Zionism” had become, for a segment of the population, a coded way of framing hostility toward Jews.
He said criticising Israel on the basis of foreign policy is one thing, “but when you criticise the right of a people to their homeland, to me that speaks to antisemitism.”
Push, pull and personal factors
Dr Roose described “push” factors such as the housing affordability crisis and, for example, growing numbers of men unable to afford a home or find a partner, which intersect with masculinity and social disadvantage to make people more receptive to extremist “pull” factors — the narratives themselves.
Those narratives, he said, are spread not only by violent extremist groups and hate preachers but by online “grifters” who profit from anti-Jewish content, citing misogynistic influencers who have “branched into antisemitism.”
He also pointed to “personal” psychological factors, including mental health issues and, per some research, links between autism spectrum disorder and vulnerability to extremist narratives.