It takes a brave person to tackle the State of Israel or Zionism publicly in Australia – especially when you’re Jewish. What comes next is often unpleasant and painful: locked out of Jewish communal spaces; ostracised by family members; condemned privately as a traitor and self-hating Jew.
These dissenting Jewish voices soon learn a salient lesson: call yourself Jewish, critique Zionism and you will pay a price. It’s the lesson others – across time and diasporas, from philosopher Hannah Arendt to former Australian governor-general Sir Isaac Isaacs – have discovered.
This is the path Kea Cranko is now walking. The bright and curious 23-year-old from Sydney’s inner west has just released In Dialogue: Jews on the Borderlands – a self-funded, largely self-made documentary film about Australia’s non-Zionist Jewish Left.
Read about In Dialogue: Jews on the Borderlands, a new documentary made by Kea Cranko. The film explores Australia’s non-Zionist Jewish Left and the cost of speaking out against Israel. She spoke to Plus61J about the project.
Watch the documentary here.