Jewish patients requested their religion be removed from hospital admission records following allegations that nurses made menacing comments about refusing to treat Israeli patients, the royal commission on antisemitism heard Tuesday. The revelation underscores concerns about institutional safeguards and the politicization of healthcare services meant to serve all Australians regardless of background.
The Royal Commission on Antisemitism and Social Cohesion, sitting since May, focused this week on education and training across schools, workplaces, healthcare facilities, and arts organizations. On Wednesday, the inquiry will hear from South Western Sydney Local Health District CEO Sonya Marshall about policies implemented after two former nurses at Bankstown Hospital were accused in February 2025 of saying they'd refuse to treat Israeli patients. Both former nurses have pleaded not guilty to one charge of using a carriage service to menace, harass or offend, while one faces an additional charge of threatening violence to a group.
Patient Safety Concerns
Sydney Rabbi Mendel Kastel, who's worked as a chaplain with NSW Health for several years, told the inquiry many Jewish Australians became apprehensive about attending hospitals after the allegations surfaced. "St Vincent's [Hospital Sydney], for instance, was taking calls from patients all through the hospital saying, 'Please take my religion off my record,'" he testified.
Rabbi Kastel said discussions with NSW Health reached a troubling point. "After the story with the nurses there was real fear to the extent that even in my discussions with NSW Health, [it] was should we create a diversion or another way that people can get healthcare because they're too afraid to go to hospital," he said. His answer? "Absolutely not. We need to make sure that hospitals are safe and that people feel safe in hospitals."
He filmed a video with a Muslim colleague at Bankstown Hospital to reassure the community it remained a safe space. Royal Commissioner Virginia Bell AC SC asked whether hospital staff should be prohibited from wearing Palestinian and Israeli flag pins in the workplace "in the current climate." Rabbi Kastel supported the restriction.
Public Service Politicization
The commission also examined concerns about political activism within the public sector. In early 2024, more than 2,000 public servants signed an open letter to Prime Minister Anthony Albanese criticizing the federal government's response to the war in Gaza. "We call on the Australian Government to take swift and decisive action tend its support of the genocide, ethnic cleansing and illegal occupation of Palestine by immediately ceasing all military exports to Israel," the letter stated.
Australian Public Service Commission acting deputy commissioner Joanne Talbot acknowledged the letter raised serious questions about political neutrality. "To circulate an open letter identifying them as [public servants] speaking of the Australian government's complicity in the Palestinian genocide, is there a question about whether that's abandoning political neutrality?" Commissioner Bell asked. "It is highly concerning and it does border on being apolitical," Talbot responded. "I believe some people were sanctioned but I don't know what happened to those employees."
NSW Public Service Commissioner Kathrina Lo was more direct. "That is clearly a case where public servants crossed the line," she said. "The actions there weren't consistent with the legislated core values for the government sector and the requirements to remain impartial and apolitical." Lo said she and the secretary of the NSW premier's office sent a joint message to all state public servants reinforcing impartiality obligations. A similar message went out after the Bankstown hospital allegations.
Holocaust Education Under Pressure
Melbourne Holocaust Museum CEO Breann Fallon said more than 800,000 students had engaged with the centre's education programs since 1984. Dr. Fallon, who isn't Jewish, testified that her work has cost her friendships. "Generally when you say you work at a Holocaust museum there is a quite weighty pause," she said. "There has been a conflation of the work we do at the Holocaust museum with the current geopolitical context and an assumption that the museum holds a particular political view, and that you as an individual hold a particular political view. It has been commonly stated to me that 'I can no longer be your friend if you work at that institution.'"
She described heightened security concerns. "We can't get out of the car at our workplace without having to look over our shoulder to make sure we are safe," she said. "There have been issues where people have stated to me, 'Be careful, I know where you work.'"
Border Protection Measures
The Department of Home Affairs' head of immigration, Clare Sharp, gave evidence about mechanisms available to prevent people who could disrupt or harm the community from entering the country. She cited conservative speaker Candace Owens being denied a temporary visa under the character test due to comments downplaying the Holocaust's impact. Musician Kanye West, who goes by Ye, was also blocked from entering Australia over antisemitic song lyrics.
Former federal Department of Employment and Workplace Relations secretary Natalie James, who is Jewish, said she hadn't personally experienced antisemitism during her time in the public sector. But she expressed concern about inadequate guidance to combat underlying attitudes that could make Jewish people feel unsafe. "I am concerned there is a hesitancy to lean beyond the overt antisemitism and into some of this very uncomfortable space where … framing around the Middle East conflict means we are in a very grave space," she said.
Rabbi Kastel's testimony also touched on the Bondi Beach terror attack on December 14, 2025, which killed fifteen people during a Hanukkah event at Archer Park. His brother-in-law, Rabbi Eli Schlanger, died in the shooting. Rabbi Kastel became emotional discussing the One Mitzvah for Bondi campaign, which encourages good deeds to help the community. One gunman was shot dead by police at the scene, while the other remains before the courts.
Why This Matters:
The testimony reveals institutional failures that allowed political activism to compromise essential public services. When hospital patients fear identifying their religion on medical forms, the basic social contract between government institutions and citizens has broken down. The public service exists to serve all Australians impartially, not to advance political agendas—yet more than 2,000 government employees felt comfortable signing a letter accusing their own government of complicity in genocide. That such activism occurred with apparently limited consequences raises questions about accountability mechanisms within the public sector. Healthcare facilities must remain neutral spaces where professional duty overrides personal politics. The fact that NSW Health discussed creating alternative pathways for Jewish patients suggests the threat was serious enough to contemplate segregated healthcare—an outcome that should alarm anyone concerned with institutional integrity and equal treatment under law.