The royal commissioner, Virginia Bell AC SC, says Jewish witnesses have been subject to “ugly antisemitic attacks” after giving evidence of their own experiences of antisemitism.

The fourth block of hearings in Melbourne this week is examining the lived experiences of antisemitism on Jewish students and academics, including the response of universities to combat it.

Opening the hearing on Monday, Bell drew attention to the provisions of the Royal Commissions Act, which makes it an indictable offence to inflict any damage or disadvantage on a person on account of their evidence.

Four academics and students are giving evidence under a pseudonym on Monday. Also appearing is a co-convener of Students for Palestine and education officer at the National Union of Students, Yasmine Johnson, the president of the Australian Human Rights Commission, Hugh de Krester, and Josh Keller of the Australian Academic Alliance Against Antisemitism.

A Jewish student who is appearing under the pseudonym Liat has told the royal commission she lost her friends after the 7 October Hamas terror attack because of her Zionism. After the 2023 terrorist attack, she said she lost the vast majority of her non-Jewish friends. In one instance, someone at a theatre afterparty told her, “we’re not friends anymore, you’re a Zionist”. Liat said you could critique Israel without being antisemitic but she hadn’t seen “examples that accuse Israel of doing things without playing on those [antisemitic] tropes”.

She says she was called a “baby killer” and “genocide supporter” by students who were part of the Australia National University’s pro-Palestine encampment. In one instance a protestor connected to the encampment, who wasn’t a member of the university, performed a Nazi salute.

She says she felt “physically unsafe”, and called out two particular chants they used as being antisemitic: “There is only one solution, intifada, revolution” and “from the river to the sea Palestine will be free”. She also says the use of the word intifada is “in reference to historical events … which involved the murder of Jews”. Pointed to the fact some proponents of the term “intifada” aren’t calling for violence to Jewish people but to the liberation of Palestinian people she says: I think they should use a different word.

A tutor and PhD candidate at UNSW says students performed Nazi salutes towards him during a business class. Appearing before the royal commission under the pseudonym ACJ, the academic said he was teaching a class for international students at UNSW College that had nothing to do with Nazism in 2024 when four students stood up and performed the salute.

He said he was “incredibly shocked, and offended, and threatened” by the display. “My grandparents had survived the Holocaust, the Nazis … murdered a huge proportion of my family. And so when someone does a Nazi salute at me it feels like they want to kill me.”

He said he wasn’t sure if the students knew he was Jewish, but it seemed clearly directed. The academic reached out to his direct supervisors, noting it was a crime to perform a Nazi salute in New South Wales and that he intended to go to the police.

He said the students were initially issued a formal warning. NSW Police then carried out an investigation, he said, and the students were suspended and required to visit the Sydney Jewish Museum. He asked for the students to be removed from his class and was refused due to timetabling.