Australia falls silent, lights candles for Bondi Beach victims

SYDNEY: Australians fell silent in flickering candlelight on Sunday in memory of the Bondi Beach shooting victims, one week after gunmen fired into crowds celebrating a Jewish festival. A father and son are accused of targeting the beachside Hanukkah event, killing 15 people in the nation's deadliest mass shooting in almost three decades. From raucous city pubs to sleepy country towns, Australia observed a minute's silence at 6:47 pm, exactly a week since the first reports of gunfire.
Countless homes lined their windowsills with candles in a gesture of 'light over darkness', a key theme of the Hanukkah festival. 'Last week took our innocence and, like the grass here at Bondi was stained with blood, so too has our nation been stained,' said David Ossip, president of the New South Wales Jewish Board of Deputies. Summer winds buffeted flags lowered to half-mast across the country, including over the famed Sydney Harbour Bridge.
A candle was lit before thousands of people held their silent vigil at Bondi Beach. Anger spilled over at the government's perceived failure to act swiftly and forcefully enough to halt a rise in incidents since the outbreak of hostilities. Television images showed police surrounding one man who shouted: 'Blood on your hands,' as Prime Minister Anthony Albanese arrived at the ocean-side event.
Some in the crowd booed when Albanese's presence was announced at the service. The prime minister, wearing a traditional Jewish kippah, did not speak at the commemoration.
As dusk fell over the Bondi foreshore, event organisers estimated some 20,000 had attended. 'Bondi is with us, Sydney is with us, Australia is with us and the world is with us,' rabbi Yehoram Ulman said, before reading out the names of those killed. They include 10-year-old Matilda, the youngest victim, and Holocaust survivor Alex Kleytman, 87, who was killed shielding his wife from bullets.
Paramedics, police and parents of the wounded were invited on stage to light the arms of a Jewish candelabrum known as a menorah. A generation of Australians has grown up with the notion that mass shootings simply do not happen in the country. That illusion was shattered when alleged gunmen Sajid Akram, 50, and his 24-year old son Naveed trained their long-barrelled weapons on the nation's most famous beach. The attack was so unthinkable that many shrugged off the first cracks of gunfire as harmless festive fireworks.
The government has announced a suite of national measures on gun ownership and hate speech, promising stricter laws and harsher penalties. Albanese has announced a sweeping buyback scheme to 'get guns off our streets'. It is the largest gun buyback since 1996, when Australia cracked down on firearms in the wake of a mass shooting that killed 35 people at Port Arthur. Albanese has also ordered a review of police and intelligence services.
Alongside the killings, stories of immense bravery have emerged. Beachgoers grappled with the heavily armed assailants, while others shielded strangers or dashed through gunfire to treat the wounded. Shopkeeper Ahmed al Ahmed, a father of two who moved to Australia from Syria almost a decade ago, has been lauded after ducking between cars and then wresting a gun from one of the attackers. — AFP