Zibby interviews anthology co-editors Lee Kofman and Tamar Paluch about RUPTURED, a powerful collection from thirty-six Australian Jewish women responding to the October 7 attacks and the surge of antisemitism that followed. Tamar shares the grassroots origins of the project, born from women-led activism, while Lee discusses her personal experience with doxing and the painful silencing of Jewish voices in creative and academic circles. Together, they reflect on intergenerational trauma, fear, resilience, and the urgent need to document Jewish experiences in their rawest, most authentic form.

Transcript:

Zibby: Welcome so much, Lee and Tamar. Thank you for coming on to talk about Ruptured. I am so excited to hear everything you have to say. The collection of essays was so powerful and I can't count the number of times I sort of put my hand over my heart, so thank you for that dose of connection and reality and perspective. Why don't you tell listeners a little bit about it and we'll go from there. 

Lee: Uh, sure. Uh, what would you like to know, Zibby? Would you like us to talk about, uh, the content of the book or.. 

Zibby: Yeah.

Lee: How it came about? 

Zibby: Both. Both. How did this collection come about and tell me about the types of essays you were looking for, what you got, some of the themes, and I can tell you some of the things I saw. All of that. 

Lee: Fantastic. So, um, I'll let Tamar tell the origin story, how it actually came about, and if that's all right, if you Tamar. 

Tamar: Sure. 

Lee: And then I'll check in and I'll talk about what we were looking for. 

Tamar: So, um, I guess ruptured is started in response, like, well before we had the book and the bones of the book. It really was a response to the, um, events of October 7th, specifically. The, um, it was specifically ignited, I think by that very, um, primal response to the sexual crimes of October 7th that led us in Australia, um, to do a series of events, rallies, vigils over the months, um, that followed. And it really, for me,  Ruptured is like a combination of that women's led activism.

It was very grassroots, you know, it really came from a very deep, painful place. Uh, and over time what happened was, in addition to that trigger. Within Australia, there was also a huge wave, obviously of antisemitism, but a lot of it online was, was very. Female focused or gender that I would say. Uh, and that had some very devastating local impacts in Australia.

And all of a sudden we, um, a group of us who were organizing around the women's activism realized that actually local Jewish women were also feeling silenced, feeling like their voices were not strong enough and looking for ways to really process and heal at a, you know, really difficult time internationally and locally.

And that's where the anthology project came from. We decided to create an a social media platform, and then the anthology project emerged from that. And we really reached out to women across the Jewish community and said, tell us how you're feeling. Our motto was Right for your heart, right for the future. You know, a nod to the historical importance of documenting, um, and the very Jewish act of, you know, committing word to paper, um, in the pursuit of you know, preserving, uh, memories and history, but also really giving people that opportunity to heal. And we received an amazing response. We had over 150 women submit their essays, and that will form part of an unpublished manuscript, um, that's going to be archived in Israel and in Australia. But ruptured really is the curated version, um, the curated collection of essays that really evokes the heart of all that pain and all that action and all that, uh, resilience and all the hope and all the fear and everything. We condense that into  Ruptured and that is the book that Lee can show everyone the cover. 

Zibby: Oh, it looks so good. 

Tamar: Yeah. So that's how rap, that's the origin story of raptured and we're really proud to, to have this as a chapter, a written chapter in Jewish Austral history and Jewish global history.

Lee: The only thing I would like to add to this origin story is that it was actually all done by Tamar and to other wonderful activists. I came on board later and on a personal note, it could not have been a, a better timing to be asked to join the project. So I was not involved in the unpublished manuscript, but I came on board to do the book. It's a phonology I've, um, edited and, um, at the time, you know. You know, probably about all this doxing scandal in Australia, Zibby. 

Zibby: Mm-hmm. Yes. But you can tell 'cause maybe some people listening don't know. 

Lee: So it was an international, uh, scandal. I mean, there's so much to say, so I'll try to be very concise, but, uh, I was actually the founder of that notorious Zio 600 WhatsApp group in Australia. Uh, and we founded this group, uh, very soon after, uh, October seven, like literally maybe, um, three weeks later because then, you know, the com our committee was still shellshocked. Now there's so much activism here and bold voices, people doing things, but at the time we were also shell shocked and so we founded this group. You know, for creatives and academics because in our fields we, we in Australia, we immediate experienced immediate silence after October 7th. This probably was in America, I expect as well. And then we began very quickly to be pushed out to the margins. All of us, unless we were the good Jews. The Jews who, you know, denies Israel's existence.

So. Anyway, I, so I quick, I had to do something otherwise I would do just for my own personal selfish reasons because if not to act, for me it was like just to go and get really depressed seriously. 'cause I lost all my literary tribe. Uh, I just didn't want to have them. I wasn't pushed out at the time. I just didn't want anything to do with, with them.

So I created this WhatsApp group to support creatives, to support academics in all antisemitism we were experiencing. And then, uh, we were doxed by and one of the members of the group who was a American journalist in New York Times, Natasha Frost, that was all in newspapers everywhere. 

Zibby: So for people listening who don't know what doxed means, can you just explain that really quickly?

Lee: Yes, yes, of course. So, our chat of our group was, uh, released without, uh, somebody exported the chat of the group. 900 pages of three months, people talking, uh, sharing very personal stories, exposed all phone numbers, names, you know. And, uh, two very vicious group of very extreme, like real extreme anti-Zionist, uh, anti-Israel activists who then disseminated it everywhere online.

And so I, it was really surreal because, you know, I've been always on the left, I've been a, I'm, I've always like, you know, I'm a two state solution support. Uh, I always, yeah and suddenly I kind of found myself online, my pictures with the caption of genocidal design, this kind of thing. And so, so I lost a lot at that time during the doxing in terms of work, in terms of, uh, some relationships, even literacy, not friend, not friendship thing.

Things gone, which I don't believe in, but, but I felt very, very silenced because what happened with this doxing, we were everywhere in the media. But the media wrote about us. They did not speak to us. We were described as what we were not as such as, you know, pro-Israel lobbyists, uh, uh, my friends were asked if I was a Mossad agent.

One of my friends said, no, she's not fit enough. So, but I felt very, very voices. That's sort of my modern worry, modern than, uh, being heartbroken over losing my ritual tribal. Or even on paid work. I was really, really devastated by the sense that I'm talked about, but I don't, I can't speak, and I think a lot of Jewish people in Australia have, especially in my creative academic circles, have shared that feeling.

And so when Tamara asked me to come on board with this ontology. It actually was a real gift, uh, psychologically for me to, because it was like creating the WhatsApp group, you know, it's like, here's an opportunity again to try and somehow insert not just my voice, but our voices like. Quite a few voices from, of women, from our community into those public conversations about us that are not really about us.

They were some imaginary Jews in terms of what we were looking for essays. So, so the, the collection has sort of two types of contributors. Some selected works from those submissions, but also some, uh, Australian Jewish women with high public profile we approached, uh, separately because we wanted the awards we wanted to reach to not just Jewish audiences, and we really wanted to show to the world what we are about.

Because, you know, everybody talks about Jews in Australia. Nobody knows Jews in Australia. We have a tiny, tiny minority there. It's not like in, in the US there's only 114,000 of Jews. So we just wanted, we strive for diversity. We wanted women from regional areas from different types of sexuality, sexual orientation, safari women, young, old, you know, our youngest contributor is 16-year-old, our oldest in the seventies.

And we wanted to, to get different stories of experiences of what it means to be Jewish. So that's why we not didn't focus just on professional writers, but we actually went, we talked to sport, we asked a sports person the goal, uh. 

Zibby: Loved that essay so much, um, about your Australian Olympian and the story of her grandmother's necklace, who her grandmother was a Holocaust survivor. That was so moving. Oh my gosh. That was one of my favorites, I think. Anyway, sorry to cut you off. Keep going. 

Lee: Oh, no, no, no, no, no. It's, I, I talk too much. I think the last thing I'll say is that we really, one of the briefs we gave to people we commissioned, and one of the sort of briefs in our heads we, we worked with when we were editing essays was that we really wanted authenticity.

We didn't want the essays to pretend that everything is fine. Now, if, if there was some positive resolution, that was great, but we didn't want to create this sort of fakely redemptive collection of essays at the time, but the war is still going on. The antisemitism is going on. So we didn't want to create a dark book or a light, a positive book.

We wanted to create authentic, complex book with a range of stories and feelings. Emotionally diverse book as well. 

Zibby: Wow. Well, I was struck by how many. People obviously felt shocked and horrified. You know, as we all were by the events of October 7th, how many people had ties to the Holocaust and how triggering it was.

You referenced already the this propulsion to. Well compulsion, I guess, for us to record. And one essay really touched on the trauma of seeing images of the Holocaust too young, and realizing how many were buried underground, as we all know as grownups, but that this is our way to record and hopefully prevent these things from happening.

And yet here we are. And so I feel like there was almost this disappointment. To the older generation that like we haven't been able to keep it up. Did you get that sense too? 

Tamar: Yeah, absolutely. Um, as the daughter of, uh, a third gen, oh, um, as we call it in Australia, I don't know if that's common term in America as the granddaughter of survivors, um, on my dad's side and also on my, um, partly on my mother's side.

That was, I remember in those early days, I just would look at my dad and think about how he grew up in his home and the silence of the early years, and then how our grandparents started talking and telling us these stories and sharing what the number meant. And I just remember saying to him, I'm sorry, like I'm really sorry.

I feel like you gave us the golden era and now it's over. And look, there are lots of questions now is it over or is this just going to be another cycle in Jewish history where we have this, this, um, nadir and then we come up again? All these conversations really interesting, but this was so visceral for so many of us, so many people.

You know, I, I just got a message from my friends overnight, whose daughter was at on school excursion at one of the museums in Melbourne, and they were accosted by a group of other students yelling at them, free Palestine, all of that, and like our grandparents in Australia, we actually have the largest Holocaust survivor community outside of Israel because people wanted to get away as far as possible, and for each person who is experiencing antisemitism, who has, um, those roots in their family.

This is so deeply triggering. And I think that one of the most offensive aspects of what's been happening definitely in Australia with like the local activists who are very virulent, is this weaponization of our anxiety. Uh, you know, everyone speaks about us weaponizing antisemitism, other people weaponizing aism.

But there's actually something really ugly that's happening, which is like dismissing and maligning. Like the truth of our experiences, which like many other groups by the way. And for us, this is important. It isn't just about the Jewish story. It is the story of so many people who have suffered so much and had those migration patterns around the world, you know, to flee persecution.

And for us it's, you know, like when it's dismissed in such a horrific way in the name of social justice. Even more so. Right. It is just so painful and I think that has been something very, very palpable in the essays, in ruptured, um, and broader collection. But yeah, in the essays, in ruptured, definitely that through in many places.

Lee: Can I just add to this, uh, that's so true. This, this Tamar, the weaponization of, I'm sorry, not the weapon to say what we weaponizing the Holocaust. It's very. And we are weaponizing our pain. It's, it has become so fashionable, but you know the bodies that don't lie. And so as one of our essays writes, and there is a research into it, which I looked in as well, the rate of mental and physical disorders among this very small Jewish community in Australia.

Uh, skyrocketing at the moment. I mean, insurance, I insurers talk about it because it costs them a lot of money. People just, ill just really weird illnesses are erupting everywhere. So, you know, as I said, this is, this is, it's a deeply embodied intergenerational trauma. And, um, one of the essays in our book, um uh, wrote a line, which really kind of for me was devastating. I remember when, and I read it again and again, is when editing, she wrote something like that she's happy with her grandmother, who was a Holocaust survivor, is not alive today, and I mean it to say something that this is very, I don't know. This says so much about our times.

Zibby: It's true. Oh my gosh. Rochelle Unrich, who was actually a contributor to our anthology on Being Jewish Now and contributed also to yours, and she, of course wrote a whole book about her mother's experience in the Holocaust and all of that, but wrote in your essay in your collection about the fear. Right.

And that in one of her events recently, someone, a man got up, she couldn't see his face and just because she was Jewish, she was talking about her book. Yes. But that wasn't about the current situation obviously, or anything like that. It came out right after. And what if, what if he had had a weapon? What if he had turned on her?

The security was lax at the event as it is at most events. And, well, I shouldn't say that, especially in the beginning when people weren't prepared for the the intrusions and just how we don't know what's coming next, and I felt like that was such a perfect metaphor, right? It's right there, but we can't see what they're up to and all we feel is fear. 

Lee: Well, I must say that, I dunno what you, the experience was tomorrow when you was still here or what it's like now for you in, in LA, but every time I go to teach, um, these days, I mean, I, I am a writer, but also I make my living as a teacher of writing and mentor. And so every time I go to teach these days for the last two years, I mean since October seven, I am really nervous.

I look behind my shoulder, I look at the list of the names of my students. Uh, nothing happened yet, but I had a couple of times when I had a very, like I would sometimes, you know, people come to my classes, they might have some mental health problems, or I have a couple of times a bit unstable looking students and I in the past, before October 7th, I would not have made much of it. I would, you know, I'm also a trained social worker. Um, I worked in mental health. I'm normally not, I don't have an issue with mental illness. I'm used to it. I have it in my family as well. But since October 7th, I'm ashamed to admit this, but that's the reality.

When I get people who seem a bit unstable, I think as, as you said, they do they have a weapon in their bag, as you know? Did they come to my class because they know who I am? Because I'm a genocidal Zionist according to, to the social media. And, um, every Jewish writer I've spoken to, including Rochelle, of course, all she wrote about it, uh, have had these experiences of being really terrified on stage somewhere.

Tamar: I will never actually forget that. And Lee, I was very lucky to know Lee through her online, um, classes during COVID, I think it was. I've, you know, been working on my writing for many years. And, um, I got to know Lee through her class. Um, and then sadly I got to know her through the dosing because I was involved in setting up some of the supports around the, um, the wellbeing of the people who are dogs.

Lee: You were amazing. 

Tamar: No, no, no. That's, but, but what happened was, I remember that you wrote in the group of people who were. Come together to help. You know, I remember that day you were going to the library and you were so worried, right? I mean, yeah, yeah. And you were so worried and we're trying to get you security guys, and someone's like, I've got these two, um, Georgian guys who can come.

They're like really tough looking and you know, like it's, you know, it was so surreal. And I think, you know, Deborah Conway writes about it also in her piece as well. Debra Conway is like the Queen of Rock in Australia. And, um, she's had, you know being treated horrendously because she's so proud of who she is and so outspoken.

Um, and, and she also writes about this fear and actual physical, you know, actions that happened, um, in her, uh, performances. I think it was. Just like it's everywhere and the thing is, interestingly enough for Australians, security has been a reality since, as far back as I can remember. I remember every year on the 19th of April, there would be ax marks in the fence of our school because, and graffiti, um, in honor of Hitler's birthday.

Okay. So we always knew that it was something that was lurking. The far right in Australia has been very well de documented for many years, unfortunately. So, you know, we've just kind of gotten used to it. For me, uh, having spent a lot of time in the States, especially around the time of Pittsburgh, it was really interesting for me because, um, it was like all of a sudden Amer like, it was very, it was a huge shock to Americans and for me, I was like, oh, we grew up with this. We were very aware of it. And so it's been really interesting crossing countries. I was in Australia for three years. When October 7th happened, I was in America before that. I'm back in America. Whatever. It's all, but, so I'm seeing kind of like how the different countries also are responding to it and kind of come into terms with it, and it's very interesting.

But for us in Australia, security was always an issue. Now it's just, it's, it's from all sides and it's, you don't know where it's coming from. It's like almost like we knew where it was coming from once and now it is. It's everywhere. It feels like it's everywhere, let me say. But we have a very, yeah, we have a big silent. 

Lee: And can I just say with, uh, sorry to interrupt you Tamar, that, but when I think Tamar and my mission was in this book, and tell me Tamar if I'm wrong, but our mission was with this book, not some, not just to create a space for our community to express themselves, but really what we want to do this book is to reach out, uh, outwardly because even our close friends who are non-Jewish, like really close friends, they just don't understand the extent to what, how our lives change. I mean, these conversations we are having now Zibby about, you know, looking over your shoulder, physically not being safe. They don't understand, they, they're sort of very ,they, they don't understand it. For us, it's like every step of, sometimes it's just every, every day, all day. You're kind of aware of how you, you, you on a lot. I mean, you know, my kids and, and Tamara, Tamara wrote a beautiful essay for the book about what it's like to parent as a Jew now in post-October War, and, and I really relate to this.

I mean, my oldest son. Who is autistic. So he is a bit emotionally young, even though he's 12, he keeps saying to me, mom, I don't wanna be Jewish. I wanna be Christian now because nobody likes Jews. And I mean, in this example, what you just gave Tamma before about what happened here in the museum yesterday, there were even worse things said, much worse things said there than free Palestine.

I know a few people too, whose kids were there. People, uh, other kids were saying to Jewish kids, do dirty to Jews. I mean, this is exactly as you said, tammar. It's, it's reiteration, the Holocaust rhetoric. That's what we were said and told in the Holocaust as well. So, uh, my friends who love me dearly have absolutely no idea, and I, and I just thought, and I just think when this book is out in the few, this will be my greatest sort of joy to give it to my friends who, I mean, most of them will buy the book, but I really want, I feel like it, it'll go, it's going to be like, um, kind of very, in my life, in my life at least, it'll be a very significant uh, test for my friendships to see what their sponsor will be, because this book is, is uh, it's kind of like really opening the door and going a little common.

See what it's like to be Jewish in Australia right now, as in your collection. Zibby, you know, I'm echoing the title of your collection. 

Zibby: Yeah, no, no. I mean, we are all just trying to wrap our heads around it, and even if. We know there have been like, yes, of course we were shocked and surprised. Intellectually, we know that things have been, that it's been under there the whole time, but to see it. In all its terrible glory, so to speak, is, is really just, you know, leaving us all questioning what is the best thing. I wonder if you could share something, like, let's say you were giving a talk in front of lots of other Jewish people from around the world, and like, what would you say to them? Would you feel encouraging? Should we all, what can we do? What, what, what should we say? What's next? 

Lee: Well, for me, my message would be very, uh, simple and I'm so sorry. I know it's kind of bothersome, cliche and repeats what I said before, but I think the most important thing at the moment for Jewish people all around the world is not to stay silent, is not to feel this will pass.

Because I know that a lot of Jewish people, especially if they have a high profile, if they're not visibly Jewish, if they have a surname that is not very Jewish. A lot of them went into hiding and it's like just waiting for things to pass because they worry about losing, uh, you know, fans or following or whatever it is of work and look and it's very, very legitimate fear.

And I really, really understand them. And I don't judge. But I also think if, you know, there's so few of us in the world, every voice matters at the moment. And that's partly for, for me, why I was so eager to join the, the project at Duology. We need to speak up, not necessarily in an angry me manner, but just, just, just to humanize ourself because we are so dehumanized everywhere at the moment.

It's, uh, it just like, I mean, I've never seen, to be honest, I mean, I, as a, again, I've come from a social work background. I've worked, I've worked with minorities for, you know, for a long time. I just never seen any minority, which has been dehumanized on account of, uh can't, they're affiliated with, even if they loosely affiliated.

And I, I, so, so the what, that's the last thing I'll send and I'll hand to, to Tamar. And it's really, I mean, we, there's a lot of arguments about, is antisemitism a form of racism? And my take on it is that. It is a form of racism, but it's not just racism because we not only discriminated on account of being, uh, ethnicity and the religion, but also we held responsible for, uh, act perceived actions or real actions of country as no other minority is.

Zibby: Very true. How about you, Tamar? 

Tamar: I'd add that I think that, I think I've been listening to this podcast and I really love, um, says that, um, you know, we are the strongest generation of Jews that ever existed basically in terms of like where we're at and I feel like we should take hope from my Jewish history, which does show periods of cha challenge, but also how people rise up.

And I think that the book that our contributors really show in different ways how they have connected with themselves and with others and with community to, um, to, to do that very act of  resistance really. And I think that the book in itself, the writing of the book is also an act of, you know, resistance in that sense as well.

It draws on the biggest strengths of the Jewish people. And so for me, I feel like that's one of the things that I want, I want others to see that, but I want us as Jews to also be reminded of that. And we were just speaking with someone the other daily, and I, who actually spoke to that, like having like, you know, read the book.

She said, you know, I really just felt points of connection. I was like, oh like I identify and I can, I feel validated that I was having those thoughts. And I feel like I'm taking strength from these other essays who is going into her kitchen to bake because that's what her mother did and her grandmother did and like, so it really kind of gives people that opportunity to feel connected.

Both within our community and also show others the strengths that have carried through generations and that we've really, you know, like, you know, I spoke about my grandparents earlier and I think about their acts of resistance or just getting up in the morning and creating the safety in Melbourne where we grew up and you know, I, so I feel like that is something that I, I would want as a co as you know, as complimentary to what Lee is saying. Like there's a full suite of things that we can all be doing and I hope that that's what people take away. 

Zibby: Well thank you so much to the two of you for putting Ruptured out into the world and for all that you are doing and for talking to me today and everything. So congratulations on the book and thanks for doing such important work.

Tamar: Thank you. 

Lee: Thank you so much, Zibby, for having us. 

Tamar: We really, you know, we look across the oceans and um, see that you are doing incredible work as well. And so, um, from Australia, I know that a lot of people really took a lot of strength when on being Jewish now came out. Um, it was also a lot of pride having an Australian in there, a she, but um, but I know that it was really people were like, yes, we need this. This is what we need now. We need to hear these stories, we need to write these stories. And yeah, so.

Lee: And in fact every few days somebody would come to me and say, do you know about Zibby Owens? You should contact too. 

Zibby: Oh, okay. All right. Well hopefully we'll, uh, reconnect in person one of these days.

Tamar: Wonderful. Great. 

Zibby: Alright. 

Lee: Thank you.