"It’s a bit hot to be wearing that scarf, isn’t it?"

On Monday, the Australian Jewish News reported that a Jewish artist in Sydney’s east “was left feeling shocked and uncomfortable” after attending Randwick City Council’s recent art exhibition commemorating International Women’s Day.

The artist, named as Lily, said that Randwick Greens councillor Rafaela Pandolfini’s decision to wear a keffiyeh while she emceed the event left her feeling “threatened” and like “the Jewish community is being terrorised”.

“I was shocked and very surprised because, unlike other people, I was naive about the prevalence of anti-Zionism and antisemitism in the arts world,” Lily said.

Lily complained about Pandolfini’s keffiyeh to Randwick mayor Philipa Veitch, who was also in attendance. When Veitch told her she supported Pandolfini’s decision, Lily raised it with Liberal councillor Daniel Rosenfeld, who reported it in turn to Randwick Council general manager Ray Brownlee.

Pandolfini has a very different interpretation of what happened that evening.

“A woman came up to me after my emceeing responsibilities and spoke to me very closely. She said, ‘It’s a bit hot to be wearing that scarf, isn’t it?’” Pandolfini says. “She took out her phone and started following me very closely while filming me, which I found very intimidating.”

After the incident, Pandolfini noticed a spike in people viewing her LinkedIn page, as well as an increase in abusive messages. It wasn’t until several friends contacted her that she discovered that her contact details had been published in a video that has been widely circulated on Australia-based Zionist Instagram pages.