The UK’s Chief Rabbi has revealed that his cousin and his cousin’s wife “spent 15 terrifying minutes hiding under a doughnut stand” as gunmen opened fire during an attack on a Hanukkah event in Bondi Beach.
“People to their right and left were being shot dead,” Sir Ephraim Mirvis stated, highlighting the severity of the situation.
The assault, which occurred on Sunday at a Jewish celebration on Sydney’s Bondi Beach, Australia, resulted in the deaths of fifteen people, including a 10-year-old girl.
Rabbi Mirvis affirmed that nothing would deter Jewish people in the UK and worldwide from publicly celebrating their faith. Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer pledged to protect British Jews following the attack, emphasizing that it was not an “isolated incident.”
The Chief Rabbi, representing the largest Jewish community in the UK, also stressed the importance of addressing the roots of “toxic antisemitism” and urged authorities to take firm action against hate speech.
Reports indicate that approximately 1,000 people were present at the Bondi Beach Hanukkah celebration on Sunday evening when the shooting commenced. Verified videos depict attendees screaming and fleeing amidst a barrage of gunfire.
The victims range in age from 10 to 87 years old, and include two rabbis and a Holocaust survivor.
Local media have identified the two gunmen as 50-year-old Sajid Akram, who died at the scene, and his 24-year-old son, Naveed Akram, who is hospitalized in critical condition. Reports suggest they had pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group.
Rabbi Mirvis, who is scheduled to travel to Sydney on Tuesday, lamented that Jewish people had been “targeted for the simple act of gathering together, visibly and peacefully, as Jews.”
He asserted that the right of Jewish communities to gather safely and publicly serves as a “test of the moral health of any society.”
“Jews have lived with security concerns for as long as I can remember, but the fact that today every public Jewish gathering must be weighed for risk is a sign of something deeply wrong,” he stated.
He further argued that a society in which a minority group must “calculate whether it is safe to be seen together in public” is “failing all of its citizens.”
Sir Keir, who spoke with Rabbi Mirvis on Sunday night, has promised a “more visible security presence” at Hanukkah events following the attack.
“It has impacted on Jewish communities here in the UK, that I know feel even more insecure today than they did before,” he told a Commons committee on Monday.
“This is clearly not an isolated incident, and these incidents are chillingly focused on some of the holiest days of the Jewish calendar,” the PM said, referencing an attack on Heaton Park Synagogue on Yom Kippur that left two Jewish victims dead.
Sir Keir affirmed the government’s commitment to “take every step we can and use all powers” to ensure the safety of British Jews.
Justice Minister Alex Davies-Jones traveled to Manchester to celebrate Hanukkah with survivors of October’s attack, which occurred on the holiest day of the year for Jews.
Approximately 200 members of the Manchester Jewish community gathered at the synagogue to light the menorah for Hanukkah and to commemorate the lives lost in both Manchester and Bondi.
Rabbi Daniel Walker led the service, urging attendees to find “light in darkness.” The menorah was lit by the widow of Melvin Cravitz, who was killed in the attack.
Earlier, Rabbi Mirvis expressed his appreciation for the work of the UK government and the police in protecting British Jews, who he described as being “on the front line” and having faced repeated “terrorist attacks.”
However, he implored authorities to address the underlying causes of hatred, “not just the symptoms.”
He called for unity in standing together “against the normalised rhetoric that demonises Jews and the only Jewish state.”
The Chief Rabbi asserted that “for far too long we have allowed chants such as ‘globalise the intifada’,” which he believes “incite hatred and which inspire people to engage in hate action.”
“Why is it still allowed? What is the meaning of globalise the intifada? I’ll tell you the meaning… it’s what happened on Bondi Beach yesterday,” he stated.
He added: “We have to be far stricter with regard to what people are allowed to say and to do in a way which incites the hatred, which produces the violence that we have witnessed.”
The Community Security Trust (CST), the organization responsible for security arrangements for UK Jewish communities, informed the BBC that the UK has experienced record levels of anti-Jewish hate crime, which began escalating immediately following the 7 October 2023 attack by Hamas on Israel.
Dave Rich, the CST’s head of policy, told the Today programme that “we have had huge protests ongoing in our city centres and university campuses with language like calls for intifada.”
“Jewish people see a connection between violent words and violent actions,” he said, adding that the Bondi attack was “the extreme end of this political spectrum.”
Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch expressed that she was “absolutely horrified” by the attacks.
When asked if the government was doing enough to tackle antisemitism, she responded: “I think that for several years now we have not done enough.”
When posed with a similar question, the Prime Minister’s spokesman told reporters that funding and efforts were already in place to crack down on antisemitism following the Manchester attack.
Speaking on behalf of the government, Lord West later told the House of Lords that while there was “no specific intelligence of a linked threat” in the UK to the Bondi attack, “we must remain vigilant.”
Shadow Attorney General Lord Wolfson—a relative of British Rabbi Eli Schlanger, who was killed on Bondi Beach—told a memorial in Parliament Square on Monday evening that the UK needed to be more assertive in combating the root causes of antisemitic violence.
Public Health Minister Ashley Dalton was met with repeated boos and heckles, including cries of “shame,” “rubbish,” and “stop the marches,” when she expressed her solidarity with the Jewish community.
The festival of Hanukkah commemorates the revolt of a small group of Jews, some 2,150 years ago, against Emperor Antiochus, who had suppressed their faith and demanded their conversion to ancient Greek religion under penalty of death.
Led by the Maccabee family, the group removed Greek idols from the temple in Jerusalem and, according to the story, managed to light its menorah for eight days with only one day’s worth of oil.
Rabbi Mirvis stated that the message of the festival is about the Jews’ “refusal to be intimidated or erased.”
“The Jewish community is nervous. The Jewish community is strong. The Jewish community is worried, but we’re tenacious. You’ll see us during the eight days of Hanukkah, we’ll be out there.”
Eleven minutes of video capture the moment Bondi beach turns into a scene of horror.
Eleven minutes of video capture the moment Bondi beach turns into a scene of horror. BBC Verify has analysed dozens of videos from the attack.
Videos and eyewitness accounts reveal how Australia’s worst mass shooting in nearly three decades unfolded.
Scotland’s first minister condemned the attack that killed 15 people at Sydney’s Bondi Beach on Sunday
Fifteen people, including a 10-year-old and a Holocaust survivor, were killed in an attack targeting a Hanukkah event in Sydney.
Two gunmen involved in the attack have been identified by the Australian authorities as a father and son.