Museum wants Holocaust education to create 'a safe Australia for everybody'

Melbourne Holocaust Museum calls for national education program to combat antisemitism Mon 20 Jul 2026 at 5:19am In short: Chief executive officer Breann Fallon says staff and volunteers at Melbourne Holocaust Museum have been subject to a rise in hateful comments since the Bondi terror attack last year. She says education is needed to address antisemitism and has called for a national minimum standard for Holocaust education in the Australian curriculum. What's next? Dr Fallon is expected to give evidence at the Royal Commission into Antisemitism and Social Cohesion. A museum designed to preserve history and educate the community on the atrocities of the Holocaust, so that history does not repeat itself, has been subjected to hateful comments causing distress to its staff. Melbourne Holocaust Museum chief executive Breann Fallon said in the aftermath of the antisemitic terror attack at Bondi last year, museum staff and volunteers received a lot of support from the broader community. But she said there had also been an uptick in negativity and hate. "When you pick up the phone, you don't know what's going to happen on the other end, and so it's this sort of underlying sense of awareness and having to be alert at all times," Dr Fallon said. "We can't get out of our car safely in the street without looking around to see who's there." Dr Fallon is due to give evidence as part of the Royal Commission on Antisemitism and Social Cohesion, which was announced after Australia's worst terror attack in which 15 people were killed at a Hanukkah event on Bondi Beach. In its submission to the royal commission, the museum highlighted daily experiences of hate which Dr Fallon said had personal consequences for staff and volunteers. The submission notes a decline in abuse following antisemitic incidents such as the firebombing of the Adass Israel synagogue in Melbourne and the attack at Bondi, but said they then resume "often more frequently and with more vitriol than prior to the attack". It outlines a number of trolling comments on social media as well as threatening emails and voice messages the museum received. "Our staff are remarkable and very resilient and we have a lot of mechanisms in place to look after them, but we are all carrying a burden of what it means," she said. Fear of antisemitic attacks meant the museum's budget for security rose from $19,000 in 2020 to $291,000 in 2025. The funds have gone towards enhancing museum security including installing bollards on the street to prevent ram raids, installing comprehensive CCTV systems, introducing new night time security patrols, and developing a crisis support plan for staff, among other measures. In its submission the museum said this increase in expenditure reflected "the scale and immediacy of the evolving threat environment". The royal commission will examine security at Jewish community sites this week, before turning its focus to education and policy frameworks on antisemitism in its final block of hearings. Education part of the solution Melbourne Holocaust Museum was founded in 1984 by Holocaust survivors, some of whom continue to personally share their stories with visitors. "Most of them came here because they wanted to get as far away from Europe as possible," Dr Fallon said. "They really felt as though Australia was this haven, this place where it was this paradise where they could be themselves and openly be who they are." Despite being shocked by the rise of antisemitism in Australia and a perceived lack of neighbourliness since the Bondi attack, Holocaust survivors believed education played a critical role in changing that, Dr Fallon said. "All of our research showed that there's something really powerful in creating dialogue across difference through that power of storytelling," she said. "It allows us to break down barriers. It allows us to meet the other person where they're at." About 30,000 students attend the museum each year and tens of thousands of others from the general public also pass through. The museum offers outreach programs including visiting workplaces to educate adults on the Holocaust while strengthening workplace culture, ethical leadership and social cohesion. Dr Fallon has called on the establishment of a national mandated standard for Holocaust education and dedicated funding for places like the museum. She said education for the whole community could be a solution to antisemitisim, proven in some of their own research. Preliminary data of a program the museums runs showed nearly 90 per cent of participants indicated an intent to change the way they approached brave conversations in the workplace. "We know that we have the skills there, but we forget them. We forget to go in and be curious. We forget to go in and ask questions," Dr Fallon said. "We're not listening to understand, we're listening to respond." The program aims to equip workplaces with the tools to respond to incidents of antisemitism and discrimination which can be transferable across other aspects of life. "While antisemitism is a forefront concern, we want a safe Australia for everybody,"Dr Fallon said. Dr Fallon said it was not just the job of teachers to educate and solve societal issues but the entire community needed to be involved in the conversation. "Every Australian is on the front line ... we are all part of the solution," she said. "It's our responsibility to make sure that we leave the world better than what we found it."