One gunman, 50-year-old Sajid Akram, was fatally shot by police. The other shooter, his 24-year-old son Naveed Akram, was wounded and was being treated at a hospital
Two gunmen who killed at least 15 people at a Jewish celebration at Sydney’s Bondi Beach in Australia were a father and son, police said on Monday. It was the deadliest shooting in Australia in almost three decades in a country with strict gun control laws.
One gunman, 50-year-old Sajid Akram, was fatally shot by police. The other shooter, his 24-year-old son Naveed Akram, was wounded and was being treated at a hospital, said Mal Lanyon, New South Wales police commissioner.
The duo were likely of Pakistani origin, CBS News reported, citing US intelligence officials briefed on the investigation. A picture of Akram’s New South Wales driver’s licence is also going viral on social media, where he appears to be wearing a green shirt resembling a Pakistani cricket team jersey.
The son is an Australian-born citizen, while the father arrived in 1998 on a student visa, which was transferred in 2001 to a partner visa and later resident return visas, Australia’s Home Minister Tony Burke said.
About The Bondi Beach Shooting
The violence erupted at the end of a summer day when thousands had flocked to Bondi Beach, an icon of Australia’s cultural life. They included hundreds gathered for the Chanukah by the Sea event celebrating the start of the eight-day Hanukkah festival.
Witnesses said the attack lasted about 10 minutes, sending hundreds of people scattering along the sand and into nearby streets. Police said around 1,000 people had attended the targeted Hanukkah event, which was held in a small park off the beach.
According to authorities, emergency services were called at about 6:45 p.m., responding to reports of shots being fired. Video by onlookers showed people in bathing suits running from the water as shots rang out. Separate footage showed two men in black shirts firing with long guns from a footbridge leading to the beach.
Police have not said what weapons were involved in the attack, but video from the scene showed the men firing what appeared to be a bolt-action rifle and a shotgun.
One dramatic clip broadcast on Australian television showed a man appearing to tackle and disarm one gunman before pointing the man’s weapon at him, then setting the gun on the ground. New South Wales Premier Chris Minns called the man, identified by relatives to Australian media as fruit shop owner Ahmed al Ahmed, a “genuine hero”.
A fundraising page for the man had raised more than A$200,000 ($133,000) by Monday morning.
Police said one gunman was known to security services, but Mal Lanyon, New South Wales police commissioner, said authorities did not indicate a planned attack.
Authorities raided the home of the alleged attackers in Bonnyrigg, a suburb around 36 km (22 miles) west of the Central Business District, where there was a heavy police presence on Monday, with a cordon wrapping around several neighbouring houses.
About Victims
Those killed were aged between 10 and 87 years old, Minns told reporters. At least 42 others were being treated at hospitals on Monday morning, several of them in a critical condition.
Chabad, an Orthodox Jewish movement that runs outreach worldwide and sponsors events during major Jewish holidays, identified one of the dead as Rabbi Eli Schlanger, assistant rabbi at Chabad of Bondi and an organiser of the event.
Mass shootings are rare in Australia, one of the world’s safest countries. Sunday’s attack was the worst since 1996, when a gunman killed 35 people at the Port Arthur tourist site in the southern island state of Tasmania.
“We were in the water and next second we see people laying on the floor, a kid was shot, it was probably the worst thing I’ve ever seen,” Trent Tur, an 18-year-old lifesaver told news agency Reuters.
“Honestly, it’s terrible. As a community we can move forward from this, it will be hard but the spirit, the Australian spirit in Bondi is very high and we can move forward.”
Rabbi Mendel Kastel, whose brother-in-law Eli Schlanger was killed in Sunday’s attack, told Reuters it had been a harrowing evening.
“You can very easily become very angry and try to blame people, turn on people but that’s not what this is about. It’s about a community,” he said.
World Leaders Condemn The Attack
Authorities said they were confident only two attackers were involved in the incident, after previously saying they were checking whether a third offender was involved.
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese visited Bondi Beach on Monday morning and laid flowers near the scene of the attack, while some mourners wearing kippah, or skullcaps worn by some Jewish men, were seen placing candles, flowers and Israeli and Australian flags.
Albanese earlier called the attack a “dark moment for our nation,” and said police and security agencies were thoroughly checking the motive behind the attack.
“What we saw yesterday was an act of pure evil, an act of antisemitism, an act of terrorism on our shores in an iconic Australian location,” Albanese told reporters.
“The Jewish community are hurting today. Today, all Australians wrap our arms around them and say, we stand with you. We will do whatever is necessary to stamp out antisemitism. It is a scourge, and we will eradicate it together.”
Albanese said several world leaders, including US President Donald Trump and French President Emmanuel Macron, had reached out, and he thanked them for their solidarity. Prime Minister Narendra Modi has also condemned the attack.
“In Australia, there was a terrible attack … and that was an antisemitic attack, obviously,” Trump said during a Christmas reception at the White House on Sunday, paying his respects to victims of the attack at Bondi and another shooting at Rhode Island’s Brown University.
Worst Antisemitic Attack In Decades
Sunday’s shootings were the most serious in a string of antisemitic attacks on synagogues, buildings and cars in Australia since the beginning of Israel’s war in Gaza in October 2023.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he had warned Albanese that Australia’s support for Palestinian statehood would fuel antisemitism.
