Bondi Beach terror attack: 4 things you should know as 12 dead in Australia shooting

An event to celebrate the Jewish festival of Hanukkah (or Chanukah) was underway at the beach when the attack happened.

Israel’s President, Isaac Herzog, said “Jewish sisters and brothers in Sydney” had been “attacked by vile terrorists as they went to light the first candle of Chanukah.” He also said, “Time and again we called on the Australian government to take action and fight against the enormous wave of antisemitism that is plaguing Australian society.” The Israeli embassy in India posted on X, “Those who call to ‘globalise the intifada’, are de-facto calling to murder innocent Jews on a global scale.”

This is not the first time Jews have been targetted in Australia. Here is what to know.

What is known about the Bondi Beach attack so far?

More than 1,000 people were present at the highly popular tourist destination of Bondi beach when the shooting took place. Mass shootings are rare in Australia, as after a 1996 incident in Port Arthur which killed 35 people, gun laws were made very strict.

In the Bondi incident, police have said that apart from the two shooters, the possibility of a third person being involved is being probed. Several suspected Improvised Explosive Devices (IED) have been found. The police are calling the incident a terror attack and Naveed Akram’s attack is being raided.

What is Hanukkah?

Hanukkah is an eight-day Jewish festival, which starts from the 25th of the Hebrew month of Kislev. This year, it is being celebrated from December 14 to December 22. Also called the Festival of Lights, it involves lighting the menorah, or a nine-armed candelabra. One lit candle on the candelabra is used to light the others one by one through the eight days.

Hanukkah commemorates the victory of the Jews over their Greek rulers in the second century BCE and reclaiming the Holy Temple of Jerusalem. “When they sought to light the Temple’s Menorah (the seven-branched candelabrum), they found only a single cruse of olive oil that had escaped contamination by the Greeks. Miraculously, they lit the menorah and the one-day supply of oil lasted for eight days, until new oil could be prepared under conditions of ritual purity,” according to the website of the Chabad-Lubavitch Hasidic movement.

What were some recent attacks against Jews in Australia?

In Sydney last year, on October 13, antisemitic graffiti was found on a Jewish bakery, with a note asking the owner to “be careful”. In the same month, the front door of a Bondi brewery, Curly Lewis Brewing Company, was set on fire while the neighbouring Bondi Kosher deli Lewis’ Continental Kitchen was set alight, Reuters reported.

Similar such incidents were reported from other parts of the country too, since Israel’s war on Gaza began in October 2023. In August this year, Australia accused Iran of orchestrating two antisemitic arson attacks in Sydney and Melbourne and asked Tehran’s ambassador to leave the country.

“These were extraordinary and dangerous acts of aggression orchestrated by a foreign nation on Australian soil. They were attempts to undermine social cohesion and sow discord in our community,” Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese then said. Iran rejected the claims.

How big is the Jewish community in Australia?

Australia’s Jewish population was estimated to be 116,967 as per the 2021 Australian census, around 0.46 per cent of the total population of 25.4 million. “Ninety-four per cent of Australian Jews lived in capital cities, with 84 per cent in either Melbourne (an estimated 53,373 Jews) or Sydney (an estimated 43,738),” according to The Australian Jewish News.

While the first Jews to arrive in Australia were convicts from England, in the last years of the 19th century, thousands of refugees from Eastern Europe also flocked to Australia. Then, during and after World War II, many Jews who escaped the Nazis came to Australia.