But first …
Compañerxs in Buenos Aires are facing heightened state repression in very difficult circumstances. Currently, La Cultura Del Barrio, ‘the first and only antifascist social and sports club in Latin America’, is appealing for funds in order to continue its vital work. As they note, ‘The outlook is not encouraging, but it is precisely at times when the capitalist class is waging its most frontal attack on workers, trying to impose a vision of society which degrades our existence to a war of all against all to survive that it is most important to support and maintain self-managed collective spaces.’ Please donate to Accion Antifascista Buenos Aires if you’re able.
1) ‘Oh Stefanaki, will you ever learn?’
It’s not been reported by Australian media as far as I know, but last week Melbourne-based neo-Nazi Stefan Eracleous (AKA ‘Australian Meditations’) was sentenced in Heidelberg Magistrates’ Court for a number of minor crimes.
You may remember Stefanaki from such headlines as Neo-Nazi unmasked as former Young Liberal (Nick McKenzie, The Age, February 12, 2022) and Melbourne man accused of making violent threats against senator Lidia Thorpe (ABC, August 26, 2023).
The St Tarrant fan’s crimes included his publication/distribution of a video in 2022 targeting Senator Lidia Thorpe (use carriage service to menace, harass or cause offence) and ah, scrawling swastikas on a public library toilet (intentional damage to property and intentional display of a Nazi symbol). For his troubles, the ex-University of Melbourne Liberal Club office-holder got a slap-on-the-wrist from the courts and was further instructed to stop. being. such. a. naughty. little. boy. in the future: ie, the court imposed a 15-months corrections order, 150 hours of community work and a smol fine ($550). As such, apart from anything else, Stefanaki would appear to have the signal honour of being the first individual in Victoria, and possibly Australia, to have been convicted of laws prohibiting the public display of the Hakenkreuz (see also : Nazi salute accused to fight charge in two-day hearing, Sara Cosoleto, The Canberra Times, May 9, 2024).
Curiously, Stefanaki — along with his #BFF and fellow gang member Jim/eone Roberts, who in September 2022 was judged to have been criminally responsible for ‘one of the most disgusting, vile, repugnant acts of antisemitism and racial behaviour’ that the sentencing magistrate had ever seen — was also allegedly responsible for the production/distribution of another, very similar video last year, which at the time the Australian Federal Police stated it would investigate (see : Notorious Neo-Nazis likely architects of ‘menacing’ video directed at Lidia Thorpe, Kevin Nguyen and Pat McGrath, ABC, October 11, 2023).
In any case, to compound Stefanaki’s legal difficulties, the poor wee fella was recently expelled from Tom Sewell’s nazi gang, the ‘National Socialist Network’ (NSN). The primary reason for this, according to the boy from Balwyn, was because Stefanaki had misappropriated tens of thousands of dollars that had (ostensibly) been donated to the NSN.
Cheeky!
See also : ‘It won’t silence us’: Islamophobic graffiti sprayed in woman’s driveway referred to police, David Estcourt and Alex Crowe, The Age, June 8, 2024 | Prison release of Golden Dawn founder angers Greek anti-fascists, Helen Smith, The Guardian, May 3, 2024.
2) Tory anti-antisemitism
Nevertheless, it must be said that this modern abandonment by the Germans of individual liberty and of the easy and pleasant things of life has something rather magnificent about it. The Germans may be pulling down the Churches, but they have erected the State, with Hitler at its head, into a sort of religion which produces spiritual exaltation that one cannot but admire and some small portion of which would do no harm among our somewhat irresponsible populations.
That’s Robert Menzies, the founder of the Liberal Party and the federal MP for Kooyong (1934–1966), in a letter from London to his family, dated August 6, 1938.
Prior to this, on March 30, 1933, the SS opened the Dachau concentration camp outside of Munich, followed promptly by the institution of a boycott of Jewish-owned shops and businesses in Germany (April 1), the introduction of the Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service, which excluded Jews and political opponents of the Nazis from all civil service positions (April 7) and the Law for the “Prevention of Offspring with Hereditary Diseases”, which mandated the forced sterilisation of certain individuals with physical and mental disabilities (July 14); in 1935, the (re-)introduction of military conscription (March 14) and the ‘Nuremberg Race Laws’ (September 15); in 1936, the occupation of the Rhineland (March 7) and on March 11-13, 1938, the annexation of Austria into the Nazi Reich in the Anschluss.
His letter was also sent just three months prior to Kristallnacht (AKA Pogromnacht).
Anyway, where was I?
Oh yeah.
Last month, Josh Frydenberg, another former federal Liberal MP for Kooyong (2010–2022), presented Never Again: The Fight Against Antisemitism for Sky News Australia. Columbus-like, it claims to examine ‘the alarming rise of antisemitism in Australia and its impact on our country and our democracy’.
In my view, Rupert Murdoch’s local iteration of Fox News is an especially, ah, ‘interesting’ avenue for ‘the fight against antisemitism’, given its status as having provided a platform for both the failed Frankston Führer Blair Cottrell and Canuckistanian AltRight propagandist Lauren ‘The Great Replacement’ Southern — while also being home to noted anti-racist activists like, er, Rowan Dean.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I’ve not watched Frydenberg’s documentary (and I obviously dunno how many of the Boomerwaffen who watch Sky were convinced one way or the other by his presentation), but Tom Tanuki loved it so much he watched it twice: you can read his thoughts on the subject via Frydenberg documentary ‘reframes’ legitimate protest as antisemitism (Independent Australia, June 18, 2024) or even watch how impressed he was by way of viewing Frydenberg’s Lock-Em-Up Weepfest Review on The YouTubes (June 21, 2024).
Sadly, in his fight against antisemitism, Frydenberg failed to interview fellow Tory anti-antisemite Warren Mundine, one of several celebrities to join ex-PM Scott Morrison in Sydney early this year to bravely declare ‘Never Again is Now!’ (Morrison also accused the United Nations of antisemitism at the rally). If they had spoken, it would’ve provided Comrade Josh with a truly wonderful opportunity to ask Comrade Warren why Christian nationalist crowdfunder ‘Give Send Go’ was happy to both sponsor Mundine’s ‘Conservative Political Action Conference’ and provide numerous opportunities for the NSN to raise funds to support its activities in Orstralia. That said, Fundraising website GiveSendGo defends decision to host Australian ‘whites-only’ community campaign on platform (Hannah Murphy, ABC, April 30, 2024) also manages to avoid the question, so perhaps I shouldn’t be too harsh.
See also : Strange bedfellows: Pro-Israel lobby groups embolden far-right extremists in ways that make us all less safe, Sarah Schwartz, The Politics, June 18, 2024 /// Examining the ADL’s Antisemitism Audit, Shane Burley and Jonah ben Avraham, Jewish Currents, June 17, 2024 /// Yeah Nah Pasaran! #210 w Shane Burley and Ben Lorber on fighting antisemitism with solidarity : June 6, 2024.
3) Cookers & Nazis FTW
On June 19, the Polish Club in Rowville — a suburb which previously hosted a relatively short-lived housing/training project for Sewell’s previous group ‘The Lads Society’ — was the venue for a public meeting organised by former Lad Matt Trihey of the ‘National Workers Alliance’ (NWA) in order to oppose ‘cultural diversity’, gender affirmative health care, ‘globalism’ and ‘mass immigration’ — in defence of ‘Western civilisation’.
You may remember Trihey from when he was, um, one of the women speaking out against the trans* community outside the Victorian state parliament in March this year.
The event itself was host to a glittering array of local cookers, including Craig ‘Pitbull’ Cole, Nick ‘Peacemaker’ Patterson and ‘Bad Neighbour!’ Damien Richardson. With Trihey acting as MC on the evening, the freedumb-loving throng (a few hundred mostly Boomerwaffen) was also treated to an intervention by members of the NSN, including lvl boss Tom Sewell and (his now-sidekick) Blair Cottrell, along with blabbermouth Joel Davis. Oddly enough, Mr Patterson was also one of those who helped provide security for the Melbourne leg (May 19) of the ‘Never Again is Now!’ series of rallies organised by local Christian Zionists. Featured among the speakers on May 19 was, of course, Warren Mundine (though it seems that on this occasion he needed no sponsorship from Give Send Go in order to attend).
For those of you coming in late, Christian Zionism is informed by the belief that the restoration of the state of Israel is a prerequisite for the Second Coming of Jesus Christ:
Allies for Armageddon traces the history of Christian Zionism from its sixteenth-century Calvinist roots to today’s American Christians, led by the likes of the late Jerry Falwell and John Hagee, who fit a fervent this-worldly support for Israel into their millenarian beliefs. Clark has done much more than examine the copious literature, past and present, asserting the central role of Israel in end-time prophecies. She became a sharply critical participant-observer, interviewing Christian Zionist leaders, mixing with the rank and file, attending church services, and even joining a Holy Land tour. The resulting book is an intimate portrait of what can fairly be called a cult, tightly organized and embracing a Manichaean doctrine that, being accepted as God-given, is impervious to worldly reasoning. Clark also brings out in full detail the theologically dubious alliance between the Israeli leadership and Christian Zionism, which depicts Israelis doing the heavy lifting in provoking Armageddon but not ultimately saved unless they convert to Christianity. She persuasively argues that Christian Zionism, embracing wars and rumors of wars as divinely mandated, has a significant and unfavorable impact on U.S. foreign policy toward Israel and the Middle East in general.
See also : Allies for Armageddon: The Rise of Christian Zionism, Victoria Clark, Yale University Press, 2007.
4) Very Metal
Another metal gig starring Haste (AKA Gurn) is scheduled to take place in a vewy secwet location in Melbourne in August. A model adopted by numerous fashy groups, the need to be sneaky (‘venue will be messaged on the day’) was occasioned by the unhappy fact that the last gig the boys arranged in March fell over in a heap.
Sad!
Bonus NDIS!
News of another former Lad …
