Speech by Councillor Seal Chong Wah

General Business: US based Combating Antisemitism Movement 

2nd of September, 2025

I rise to speak on the upcoming 2025 Australian Mayors Summit Against Antisemitism.

This conference is being hosted by the US-based “Combating Antisemitism Movement (CAM) as an all-expenses-paid conference promoted to Councillors and Mayors across Australia in October on the Gold Coast. This so-called antisemitism summit is being chaired by Gold Coast Mayor Tom Tate, of the Liberal National Party. 

The CEO of the Combating Antisemitism Movement-CAM was previously an Israeli Defence Force Commander who established the ‘New Media Division’ propaganda unit, branding the IDF on social media and running advocacy activities with international organisations. This Summit host earned recognition as a central figure in developing the army’s digital warfare capabilities.

Let's be really clear, CAM, the host of this Gold Coast Summit, is a Pro-Israeli Zionist lobby group founded by a Jewish American Oil Magnate and Trump donor. CAM is part of an American network of foundations who receive significant donations from multi-millionaires. One of the goals of CAM is to combat the international Boycott, Divest and Sanction (BDS) movement.

This Gold Coast conference raises disturbing ethical, political, and community concerns due the close ties with the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs, multiple Pro-Israel Zionist organisations as well as property developers. CAM is closely connected with and promotes the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation. The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation executive Chairman is also a CAM Advisory Board member. This nice humanitarian sounding foundation is part of the infamous Israeli government approved food distribution sites in Gaza. These sites have been labeled as “death traps’ - with documented killing and injuring of starving Palestinians seeking food relief. Doctors Without Borders, amongst other organisations, have called for the immediate dismantling of the government approved Gaza Humanitarian Foundation scheme.

I want to mention one more organisation, the Jewish National Fund, who is also associated with CAM, the Gold Coast summit host. The Jewish National Fund was founded to “purchase lands” for Jewish settlement, in 1948. Their primary goal has been to ethnically cleanse Palestinian land into Jewish settlements and national parks. 

At the heart of the CAM campaign strategy is the goal to promote and implement the IHRA definition of antisemitism, a highly controversial definition widely criticised for conflating antisemitism with legitimate criticism of Israel and Zionism. A conflation rejected recently by the Australian Federal Court in the ‘Werheim versus Haddad’ case. The IHRA working definition is a strategy to silence pro-Palestinian voices and advocacy, including on university campuses and within public institutions. This has been noted not only by Palestinian and Muslim organisations, but by progressive Jewish groups and civil liberties advocates.

The LNP hide their racist views behind this perverse manipulation of the IHRA definition by attempting to silence anyone who dares to criticise the IDF and the State of Israel. An attempt to silence anyone who cares about freedom, the ICJ - International human rights law, and anyone calling out the genocide. These LNP Administration attacks and false claims of antisemitism have been directed multiple times at the Greens within this Chamber.

It’s important to highlight the precarious position of Mayors and Councillors that are attending this conference, as an all expenses paid “junket” - posing a serious potential conflict of interest through being bought and influenced by this extremist organisation. 

The tide is turning! 50,000 plus people hitting the streets in Brisbane alone which was probably the second largest ever protest in our history, after the Iraq War protest in 2003, which has striking similarities. Australians are witnessing the horror of a livestream genocide. A systemic slaughter of a largely defenseless population of innocent Palestinian civilians.

Now the pro-Israel lobby organisations are making an aggressive effort to assert their influence on all levels of government and public institutions by hosting this conference in reaction to all the protests and global movement to end 58 years of occupation and ethnic cleansing. 

Thousands of Australians have signed letters to Councils urging them not to attend this conference due to this extremist far-right agenda. I sincerely hope that the Lord Mayor and the LNP Council have declined to attend this Israeli propaganda conference.