By: Nomi Kaltmann as seen in The Jewish Independent

7 July 2026

For many years, I spent hundreds of hours of my life volunteering as part of interfaith dialogue. I was driven by the belief that bringing people of different faiths together made Australia a better place for everyone, because we would all be able to support one another in times of crisis. I spent years as a board member of the Faith Communities Council of Victoria (FCCV), I attended a multifaith camp in my first year of university run by the Anti-Defamation Commission, and I was invited to countless forums to speak about Judaism to non-Jewish audiences.  

I have not stopped believing in friendships across faiths. We need allies, and some of the most meaningful support our community has received since October 7, 2023, has come from individual people of faith who have chosen to show solidarity with Australia’s Jewish community. What I have stopped believing in is the idea that formal interfaith institutions, with all their committees and endless dialogue, are an effective vehicle for building those relationships or responding when one community is under attack. 

So, when I saw this week that the Jewish Community Council of Victoria (JCCV) had been involved in consulting with the Victorian Government about the new multicultural body, which is due to replace the Victorian Multicultural Commission and establish a new entity, Multicultural Victoria, I couldn’t help but roll my eyes.  

Do you know why the Victorian Multicultural Commission is being replaced? The Victorian government conducted an extensive review and included the following asinine observation about why it was being replaced noting, “questions were raised about whether the Victorian Multicultural Commission remained fit for purpose, given increased social cohesion challenges from local and overseas events, as well as the evolving needs of multicultural communities.”  

In my mind, that’s a fancy way of saying that many of the Victorian multicultural commissioners completely failed the Jewish community at a moment when we needed them most: in the immediate aftermath of October 7 and the ensuing tide of rising antisemitism that targeted Australia’s Jewish community.  

The Victorian Multicultural Commission’s Chair, Viv Nguyen, was photographed outside the Victorian Parliament next to “sitintifada” signage. She also deleted a Facebook post made on October 8 after it attracted criticism for how bland it was in showing solidarity to Israeli victims.

Meanwhile, longstanding Commissioner Mohamed Mohideen shared several inflammatory social media posts, including amplifying material describing Zionism as “evil”, and reposted material alleging Jews had established “terrorism cells” in Europe, as well as imagery of Jewish lawyer Alan Dershowitz with devil horns. Jewish organisations repeatedly raised concerns about his conduct, and Viv Nguyen’s behaviour, yet both remained in their paid Commissioner jobs, even after Mohideen was investigated.  

With leadership like this, who needs any formal Victorian government multicultural body? 

Since October 7, I have largely walked away from organised interfaith work. I don’t know whether I believe in it anymore, at least not in its formal, institutional form. 

I have previously written about how, in the immediate aftermath of October 7, the FCCV, where I had spent months attending meetings and volunteering my time, was unable to issue a single statement expressing sympathy for the 1,200 murdered Israelis and the 250 Israelis taken hostage. The Executive Director of the FCCV wrote to me when I asked him why no statement had been issued, his explanation was that other multifaith member organisations could not reach an agreement on a statement, so they were unable to issue one. 

Think about that for a moment. 

A body established for dialogue between faith communities could not agree that the largest massacre of Jews since the Holocaust deserved a statement of condolence. 

The reason I became involved in interfaith work was because I believed relationships were important. I believed that if we spent years building trust, learning about one another and celebrating each other’s cultures and festivals, when tragedy struck there would be enough goodwill to pick up the phone, issue a statement and stand together. 

Instead, October 7 exposed just how fragile many of those relationships really were. So yes, I understand why the JCCV is engaging in good faith with the new Victorian body, but I have very little hope that this new body will change anything for our community.  

If you look back over the years, multicultural and multifaith organisations have managed to release statements after earthquakes, terrorist attacks, natural disasters and humanitarian crises across the world. Yet Israel and terror against Israelis consistently seems to be the issue that paralyses them. Suddenly, there is endless nuance, endless process, endless disagreement and endless silence. 

I understand that many people dislike the Israeli Government, and I understand that people hold strong views about Israeli policy and about the conflict in Gaza. But October 7 was not a debate about settlements or judicial reform or Israeli government policy. It was the single deadliest day for Jews since the Holocaust. Civilians were butchered in their homes, families were burned alive, women were raped, children were murdered and hundreds of people were kidnapped. 

Recognising that this was an atrocity should never have been controversial. 

There is absolutely no contradiction between supporting Palestinian self-determination and recognising that the murder and kidnapping of Israeli civilians was morally abhorrent. One does not diminish the other. 

Yet many Australian multicultural organisations have behaved as though expressing basic empathy for murdered Israelis required some impossible political balancing act. 

That is why I find the Victorian Government’s solution, and our community’s support for it, so underwhelming. 

If the culture of the members of this new body remains unchanged, then replacing the Victorian Multicultural Commission with a new name, Multicultural Victoria, is little more than administrative rebranding. The problem has never been the logo on the letterhead. The problem has always been the unwillingness to hold commissioners to consistent standards and the inability of multicultural institutions to respond with any moral clarity when Israelis are the victims. 

I still participate in some interfaith activities, but I have become far more selective. 

I no longer feel any desire to spend hours sitting in committee meetings with representatives from dozens of faith groups if, when push comes to shove, those same organisations cannot issue a simple statement condemning the massacre of Jews or are unwilling to address antisemitism within their own ranks. 

Instead, I invest my time somewhere I can actually see results. 

I regularly speak at non-Jewish schools across Australia, in person and on Zoom, teaching students in Victoria, New South Wales and Queensland about Judaism. Sometimes I speak to Year 12 classes about Jewish ethics, other times I teach about the Holocaust, antisemitism or even Orthodox Jewish approaches to feminism. 

Many of the students I teach have never met a Jewish person before. They ask thoughtful, challenging questions and they listen carefully. They are curious and they are interested in understanding with an open and respectful mind. 

Ironically, I have found it far more meaningful to teach a group of Year 10 students in far North Queensland or regional New South Wales than I have in almost any formal interfaith committee. 

So no, I am not particularly optimistic about Multicultural Victoria nor the JCCV’s engagement with them.  

For many Jews, these institutions had a chance. They failed, and now many of us are no longer interested.