This morning I wrote to the journalist at Time Magazine who had just published a heartening article, ‘The Israeli and Palestinian Women Calling For Peace’ on February 21, 2024.

Here is what I wrote:

Dear Yasmeen,
I have just read your article, ‘The Israeli and Palestinian Women Calling for Peace’.
Thank you.
Fortunately for me, my wife Sandy keeps me informed. She is the Executive Officer for the Victorian Council of Churches  here in Melbourne, Australia. 

The situation here is as about as acute as it can get without acts of physical violence. There is a complete standoff by the Jewish community who will not even be in the same room as a Muslim! The major dialogue group, the Council for Christians, Muslims and Jews has had to go into recess. Now Islamic groups are refusing invitations to Iftar dinners by government organisations. 

Melbourne has the majority of Holocaust refuges in Australia and perhaps this has contributed to it being a hub for conservative Judaism in Australia. 

I wonder whether we Australians have become too complacent of the success of Multiculturalism in Australia. Perhaps we are facing a wake-up call.

I have always valued the insight of Diana Eck at the Pluralism Project at Harvard University – the difference between ‘multi’ which simply recognizes difference, and ‘pluralism’ that requires the strategic exertion of energy to bring peace between groups. That may be the insight we need in Australia to take the success of multiculturalism forward to a new level of hospitality and respect among all our people. 

Thanks for your work as a journalist directed toward the good. I wanted to let you have a sniff of some of the local repercussions of the situation in Palestine, lest you think we are immune over here! Your sense that women hold a vital key in working toward peace is important. It has always been so. 

With very best wishes,
Geoff Boyce
Chaplain, Flinders University (retired)