Living in the western suburbs of Melbourne, a working class suburb adds an advantage over other communities. We’re rich and diverse in culture, beliefs, religions and people. International politics is something that is often discussed. I learned from an early age that I do not have an opinion on international matters. Quite rightly so, unless you’re from these communities. It is impossible to have an opinion and sometimes opinions aren’t needed or wanted. Listening goes a long way.
Over the past few years I have been able to meet and discuss important matters impacting Jewish-Australian’s in our community. As you’re aware I was involved in politics and supporting people in their time of need is what I try to do. Through discussions I got to learn more about Australia and more importantly, the Labor movement's involvement in supporting Jewish people fleeing Soviet Russia.
So let's take a look and how Prime Minister, Bob Hawke took on a superpower and won.
Bob Hawke was a man known and loved for many things and is often remembered for he's ability to scull a beer and never shied away from a challenge. The United States also had some concerns around the Prime Ministers drinking and... love of women. But it were these things that appealed to the common Australian and the working class. Afterall Bob Hawke came from a relatively privileged background.
Bob Hawke is known for many feats and fights for people of diverse background and one of those is he's work helping Jewish people in their time of need.
Bob Hawke’s relationship with Israel was never a matter of shallow diplomacy or scoring political points. It was deeply personal, emotionally charged and shaped by his broader worldview about justice, national security and human freedom. From his earliest visit to Israel in 1970 through to his reflections on Middle Eastern conflict decades later, Hawke’s engagement with Israel show’s Bob was a leader who balanced moral conviction with pragmatic realism.
Meir, deeply concerned about the occurrences to Soviet Jews who were being denied the right to emigrate, urged Hawke to use his influence as a global labour leader to advocate on their behalf. Israel, having lost diplomatic relations with the Soviet Union after the 1967 Six Day War, needed intermediaries who could reach Moscow. Without a second thought, Hawke agreed.
Hawke’s decision was the beginning of what Suzanne Rutland later described as Hawke’s “magnificent obsession” with Soviet Jewry. Acting on Meir’s request, Hawke travelled to the Baltic Sea to meet Alexander Shelepin the head of the Soviet trade union movement. What began as a union to union dialogue evolved into a decades long campaign for the freedom of Jewish “refuseniks” — Soviet Jews denied exit visas to Israel.
In 1979, Hawke returned to Israel and then travelled to Moscow to press the Soviet leadership directly. Before departing, he was briefed by Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin and Jewish activist Isi Leibler, who played a central role in connecting Hawke with refusenik families. In Moscow, Hawke met senior Soviet trade union officials and numerous refuseniks, later announcing that he had secured assurances for the release of detainees and “Prisoners of Zion”.
The announcement was made emotionally upon his arrival in Rome but was short lived. The Soviet Union soon reneged on its commitments devastating both the refuseniks and Hawke himself. In his memoirs, Hawke described the episode as one of the darkest moments of his life that haunted him for despair of people whose hopes he had raised in good faith. Yet rather than retreat, Soviet Russia underestimated Bob Hawke and this only intensified his resolve.
After becoming Prime Minister in 1983 Hawke continued to campaign for Soviet Jewry at the highest diplomatic levels. His 1987 state visit to the Soviet Union the first by an Australian prime minister coincided with Mikhail Gorbachev’s reforms and mounting international pressure. Armed with a list of refusenik families, Hawke again pressed the case for freedom. Though cautious after the failures of 1979, he finally achieved results with several families granted exit visas almost immediately and within a year, emigration restrictions were dramatically eased.
By 1988, the gates had opened. Thousands of Soviet Jews left for Israel, including refuseniks Hawke and Leibler had supported for over a decade. That year, Hawke was honoured by the World Jewish Congress receiving a humanitarian award from Edgar Bronfman before 3,000 people at Melbourne Town Hall. A rare moment of bipartisan recognition for an Australian prime minister on the world stage.
Yet Hawke’s relationship with Israel was not uncritical. In 1987 he became the first Australian prime minister to visit Israel while in office. During that visit, he publicly expressed sympathy for Palestinian aspirations, drawing parallels between Palestinians in occupied territories, Jews in the Soviet Union, and Black South Africans under apartheid. The comparison shocked many in the Jewish community and led to sharp exchanges with close allies such as Isi Leibler. Hawke’s position reflected his belief that security and justice were not mutually exclusive and applied to all.
This balancing act was also evident in Hawke’s thinking on the Arab-Israeli conflict more broadly. In his 1979 Boyer Lectures Hawke proposed what later became known as the “Hawke Peace Plan”. He supported the idea of an independent Palestinian entity but acknowledged Israel’s fear that such a state could become a launchpad for attack. His solution was blunt. If Israel were attacked after granting sovereignty, any territory it captured in self-defence should be non-negotiable. In essence, Hawke argued that aggression should carry permanent consequences.
Amid ongoing conflict in Gaza, Hawke’s views, opinions and actions remain strikingly relevant. While he placed faith in international guarantees that history has since undermined, his core principle was clear. A nation acting in self-defence should not be forced to return to conditions that threaten its survival.
Bob Hawke’s legacy with Israel is therefore neither simple nor ideological. It is the story of a leader who stood shoulder to shoulder with a vulnerable people, who suffered personally when diplomacy failed and who believed that peace could only endure if it was grounded in both justice and security.
Today the issues are more polarised debate, Hawke’s history with Israel offers a reminder that moral clarity and political complexity can and often must coexist. It's important for all people and not just the middle east.
Bob Hawke and Let My People Go: the Freedom of the refuseniks
Israel and Gaza: What Would Hawkie say?
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