Two suspected gunmen who attacked a Hanukkah event at Sydney’s Bondi Beach had traveled to the Philippines before the attack that killed 15 people and appeared to be inspired by Islamic State, police said Tuesday.
Sunday’s attack was Australia’s worst mass shooting in almost 30 years and is being investigated as an act of terrorism targeting the Jewish community.
The death toll rose to 16, including one of the suspected shooters, identified by police as Sajid Akram, 50, who was shot dead by police. The man’s 24-year-old son and alleged accomplice, identified by local media as Naveed Akram, was in critical condition in hospital after also being shot.
Australian police said on Tuesday that the two men had traveled to the Philippines last month and that the purpose of the trip was under investigation. Philippine police said they were investigating the case.
Networks linked to the Islamic State are known to operate in the Philippines and exert some influence in the south of the country. They have been reduced to weakened cells operating on the southern island of Mindanao in recent years, a far cry from the scale of influence they wielded during the 2017 siege of Marawi.
“Early indications point to an ISIS-inspired terrorist attack, believed to have been carried out by a father and son,” Australian Federal Police Commissioner Krissy Barrett told a news conference.
“These are the alleged actions of those who aligned themselves with a terrorist organization, not a religion.”
Police also said the vehicle registered to the young man contained improvised explosive devices and two homemade flags associated with ISIS, or Islamic State, a militant group designated by Australia and many other countries as a terrorist organization.
The father and son allegedly gunned down hundreds of people at the festival in a roughly 10-minute killing spree in one of Australia’s top tourist destinations, forcing people to flee and take shelter before both were shot dead by police.
About 25 survivors are receiving treatment at various hospitals across Sydney, officials said.
flower memorial
Israeli Ambassador Amir Maimon visited Bondi on Tuesday and urged the Australian government to take all necessary measures to guarantee the lives of Jews in Australia.
“Only Australians of the Jewish faith are forced to worship their gods behind closed doors, surveillance cameras and guards,” Maimon told reporters in Bondi, after laying flowers at the temporary memorial and paying respects to the victims.
“My heart is broken…it’s crazy.”
A series of anti-Semitic incidents have taken place in Australia over the past 16 months, prompting the head of the country’s main intelligence agency to declare anti-Semitism his top priority in terms of threat to life.
In Bondi, the beach was open on Tuesday but was largely empty under cloudy skies, while a memorial of growing flowers was erected at Bondi Pavilion, just meters from the scene of the shooting.
Bondi is Sydney’s best-known beach, located approximately 8.2 km from the city center, and attracts hundreds of thousands of international tourists each year.
Olivia Robertson, 25, visited the memorial before the work.
“This is the country where our grandparents came so that we could feel safe and have opportunities,” she said.
“And now it’s happened right here in our backyard. It’s pretty shocking.”
Ahmed al Ahmed, a 43-year-old Muslim father of two who charged at one of the gunmen and grabbed his rifle, remains in a Sydney hospital with gunshot wounds. He has been hailed as a hero around the world, including by US President Donald Trump.
A GoFundMe campaign set up for Ahmed has raised more than A$1.9 million (US$1.26 million).
Stricter gun laws
Australia’s gun laws are now under scrutiny by the federal government, after police said Sajid Akram was a licensed gun owner and owned six registered guns. Akram obtained his firearms license in 2023, not 2015 as previously reported, police said Tuesday.
Home Secretary Tony Burke said gun laws introduced by the previous Conservative Liberal-National coalition government after the Port Arthur massacre needed to be reviewed.
Former Liberal Prime Minister John Howard, who introduced gun restrictions in 1996, said on Tuesday he did not want gun law reform to become a “distraction” from the need to combat anti-Semitism.
Albanese has failed the Jewish community, Howard told reporters. “He should have done more to fight anti-Semitism, much more,” he said.
The 15 victims ranged from a rabbi and father of five to a Holocaust survivor to a 10-year-old girl named Matilda Britvan, according to interviews, authorities and media reports. Two police officers remain in a critical but stable condition in hospital, New South Wales Police said.
Matilda’s aunt spoke publicly about her family’s grief, saying she was devastated by her death.
“I can’t believe this happened. I look at the phone and hope it’s like a big joke, not reality,” Lina Chernykh told 7NEWS Australia.
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