Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said on Monday (December 15, 2025) that the attack on a crowd celebrating the Jewish holiday of Hanukkah at a popular Sydney beach appeared to have been motivated “by the ideology” of the Islamic State jihadist group.
“Apparently this was motivated by the ideology of the Islamic State,” Albanese said of Sunday’s shooting in which a father and son killed 15 people and wounded more than 40.
However, Albanese said he did not believe the attack was related to Australia’s recognition of the state of Palestine, as suggested by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
When asked about it in an interview with ABC Radio this Monday, Albanese said he did not believe the attack was linked to Australia’s recognition of the State of Israel, but stressed that “most of the world” recognized the two-state solution.
Progress in the investigation
The prime minister of Australia, a country that recognized the state of Palestine in late September, also said there was no evidence that the two attackers – father and son – were part of a terrorist cell and stressed that they were “clearly” motivated by an “extremist ideology”.
Authorities are keeping the Bondi beach area cordoned off and have launched a major police operation as investigations continue to establish the facts and rule out new threats into the worst shooting in the country in 30 years and the bloodiest attack in the country.
Authorities said the suspected attackers were a father and son, identified as Sajid Akran and his son Naveed Akram, originally from Bonnyrigg, a Sydney suburb, security sources told public broadcaster ABC.
Sajid had had a firearms license for a decade and owned at least six registered weapons.
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