Markets 
The world leader of the Exclusive Brethren church, which ran a covert campaign supporting the Coalition at the last federal election, has described Jews as evil, malicious infidels who are unable to ever atone for the sin of killing Jesus.
Leaked church records spanning more than two decades reveal Bruce Hales, the church’s leader and “Elect Vessel”, repeatedly preaching to his 56,000-stong global flock that Jews are beyond redemption.
“The poor Jew, still in the darkness of Judaism, trying to atone for the things they’ve done wrong; their lies and their iniquity, and their wickedness,” Hales, the Brethren’s “Man of God”, said in 2009.
The Jews’ sin, Hales insists, is not recognising Jesus as the son of God, then “murdering” Him. He refers to Yom Kippur, the holiest day on the Jewish calendar, as when Jews “go on in their darkness trying to atone”.
“They fell into evil … It’s not something they can eliminate,” he said in a separate 2009 ministry, adding in 2010 that this was a “terrible thing. What a void.”
Executive Council of Australian Jewry co-chair Peter Wertheim said the accusation that Jews were to blame collectively for killing Jesus – the “Deicide charge” – was “one of the clearest distinguishing markers of the disgrace of antisemitism”. It had “been used as the basis for untold deaths and suffering by Jewish communities for nearly two millennia”.
Publicly – most recently in evidence to a parliamentary committee inquiry – the religion now known as the Plymouth Brethren Christian Church, says it condemns antisemitism as “abhorrent” and “completely antithetical to our views”.
But in another 2020 ministry, Hales speaks of what he calls “the Jewish question” – another antisemitic trope – and their domination “by the devil”.
Hales’ preachings also feature racist comments about Asians – who he repeatedly refers to as “Orientals” and accuses of “mendacity” – and sweeping disparagement of Africa.
He has been called to give evidence to a parliamentary committee next month over his church’s multimillion dollar undisclosed campaign for the Coalition at the last election. That campaign included a shadowy operation uncovered by this masthead in which neo-Nazi associates were paid to tail and heckle MPs and disrupt Labor, Greens and teal events.
The secret “election influence” plot with the far-right went all the way to the top of the church, with leaked messages showing Hales’ son, Gareth, was among the senior elders directly involved. Gareth has also been called to give evidence.
The Coalition has defended the Brethren church’s covert campaign as an expression of the church’s religious freedom and has also repeatedly accused the Albanese government of being soft on antisemitism.
Given almost two days to comment on Bruce Hales’ ministry, seven Coalition MPs who had previously supported the church, including Liberal leader Angus Taylor, failed to respond to questions. Nationals leader Matt Canavan said: “I don’t agree with the views reported here [from Hales]. Unlike the biased and bigoted reporting of The Age, however, I don’t hold people collectively responsible for the views of one person.”
Expert in extremism and political violence Josh Roose said the church’s use of associates of violent neo-Nazis as “hired thugs” to intimidate and harass politicians marked a dangerous escalation in Australian politics.
It was an attempt to import aggressive, MAGA-style politics into a local climate where threats against both MPs and the Jewish community are already growing, he said.
“There’s a very strong potential for violence. They’re now emboldened to attack in public spaces federal parliamentarians for the first time. It needs to be investigated.”
Hales preaches in closed church meetings and “Lord’s Day” (Sunday) addresses, then his words are printed and distributed to the flock globally as “ministry” that his followers regard as holy writ.
A “Subject Index” of his most important sayings shows that in 2014 he sermonised that Jews were “just natural godless men, they were infidel Jews”.
Jews, he preached in Orange in 2005, “put Christ to death … in hatred and malice” because they were envious of him. They “murdered” Christ because “they were completely dominated by the devil”, he said in Penrith, NSW, in 2016.
The sin of killing Christ was “fixed on the Jews”, he added in 2020. “What will eventually bring in finality to the whole Jewish question, that remains in the hands of Christ and perfectly under the control of God.”
“They rejected God Himself. They had no God,” he said in Sydney in 2010. “The Jews were damned at that point … totally damned, because of their wretched infidelity.”
Hales also preaches that the West is superior to other regions, describing Asia and Africa as “terrible continents” shrouded in “darkness”.
Of Asia, which Hales refers to as “the East”, he decries “the depravity, the depravity that men have fallen into through their own folly, influence of Satan, influence of Satan’s agents”.
“The mendacity of the Eastern world or the orientals, was legendary,” he preached in 2003. Then later, in 2009: “Think of the awful treachery of the Eastern darkness, and mendacity, and intrigue, and wickedness, and corruption.”
One Brethren operative involved in the church’s secret stunt campaign disrupting the election said they had felt deeply uncomfortable being told to target MPs alongside neo-Nazi associates heckling about immigration.
Brethren spokesman Lloyd Grimshaw said, “These statements are based on Holy Scripture,” and accused this masthead of making “a selective choice of quotes … designed to misrepresent Mr Hales’ position on Jewish people”.
“The church has always strongly condemned antisemitism. The comments were made in a religious context as part of a theological discussion on the historical connection between our faith and Judaism.
“The PBCC actively supports our valued Jewish communities and regularly pray in our church services for the safety and protection of Israel and its people.”
‘The Jewish question’
Wertheim, from the Executive Council of Australian Jewry, said much antisemitism stemmed from the refusal of Jews to accept the religious claims of Jesus and Muhammad and convert. Historically, this was “seen as offensive and deeply threatening” by the leaders of those faiths.
“Jews collectively were branded as ‘Christ-killers’ by the Christian authorities (the Deicide charge) and were ruthlessly persecuted through pogroms, expulsions, the Inquisition, ghettoisation, forced conversions and other horrors … culminating in the Holocaust,” Wertheim said in response to Hales’ comments.
Rabbi Ralph Genende, the interfaith and community liaison spokesman at the Australia-Israel Jewish Affairs Council, said some of Hales’ ministry was a “dramatic expression” of widely held beliefs among fundamentalist Christians.
But his generalisations about Jews as a group, calling them “evil” and “infidels” were “very concerning, especially at a time when antisemitism is at unprecedented levels in Australia”, he said.
“Obviously, members of this church should be entitled to engage in Australian politics in the same way as anyone else,” he said. But political parties should “exercise caution about formal institutional ties with this church … until it clearly distances itself from rhetoric that condemns Jews collectively”.
After this masthead revealed the Brethren’s far-right election influence plot, seven Coalition MPs including Canavan leapt to the church’s defence, saying questions put to the Brethren by the parliament’s joint standing committee on electoral matters constituted a witch-hunt, persecution of a religious minority, were un-Australian and further evidence of the Albanese government’s push for a “Communist utopia”.
The lack of a response to questions about Hales’ ministry contrasts with the Coalition’s response to a series of tweets by Labor staffer Rhys Muldoon. In 2022, Muldoon called Liberal frontbencher Dave Sharma a “fake Jew”, and when they were recently unearthed, Sharma said: “I am surprised that the Labor Party was prepared to overlook such a vile public record, or seemingly did not bother looking”. Muldoon lost his job. Sharma did not answer multiple requests for comment on Hales’ preachings.
Two other organisations, the Australian Jewish Association and Freedom for Faith, both of which have backed the Brethren’s right to campaign at elections citing their religious freedom, also failed to respond to a list of Hales’ quotes and questions about antisemitism.
In recent weeks, the Brethren has shifted towards more overt support of Coalition rival Pauline Hanson and One Nation.
Hales preached last month: “I hope that red-haired lady gets a chance” so she could “get enough uranium together and build a few bombs” to drop on the Middle-East, obliterating Iran.
Of the covert stunt campaign, multiple rank-and-file Brethren members who were kept in the dark have since told this masthead of their horror at the church using white nationalist guns-for-hire in the attempt to influence an election.
Teal donor Climate 200, founded by Simon Holmes à Court, who was himself targeted in a far-right Brethren stunt, has referred the church to the charity regulator for investigation.
Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke has said paying such notorious characters to “stalk and intimidate” politicians was something “Australia hasn’t had before, and we shouldn’t”.
Start the day with a summary of the day’s most important and interesting stories, analysis and insights. Sign up for our Morning Edition newsletter.
Read the full article here
