Byline: Michael Gawenda

A WEEK ago, more than 400 people crammed into a hall in Caulfield for a discussion of a book. So full was the hall that young people were asked to give up their seats for older people and stand against the walls. So full was the hall that, in the end, many people were turned away at the door. The book they had come to discuss was The Hand That Signed the Paper, by Helen Demidenko/Darville, and, for those inclined to believe such things, here was the powerful Jewish lobby at work. I was not at the meeting, but have been assured by people who were there that the book was condemned by all, including the panellists who led the discussion - Quadrant editor and Age columnist Robert Manne, Age columnist Pamela Bone, Age arts editor Louise Adler, and psychiatrist Sidney Bloch. Of the panellists, only Pamela Bone is not Jewish. But among those who believe that the Jewish lobby is alive and well and influencing all sorts of things that happen in Australia, Ms Bone is, I understand, considered to be a sort of Jewish fellow-traveller. As far as I know, there was no fatwa issued (as the Iranians did on Salman Rushdie), no copies of The Hand burnt, no calls for Ms Demidenko/Darville to be in any way "punished" for writing her book. But perhaps the lobby does not decide such things at public meetings: perhaps members of a secret cell...