{"id":360880,"date":"2025-12-20T17:47:11","date_gmt":"2025-12-20T17:47:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/360880\/"},"modified":"2025-12-20T17:47:11","modified_gmt":"2025-12-20T17:47:11","slug":"australians-pause-to-mourn-bondi-terror-attack-victims","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/360880\/","title":{"rendered":"Australians pause to mourn Bondi terror attack victims"},"content":{"rendered":"

One week since terror descended on the shores of Bondi Beach, Australians will remember the 15 lives lost in a national day of mourning.<\/p>\n

Flags will fly at half-mast and buildings will be lit in yellow as the nation stands in solidarity with the Jewish community on Sunday before a formal, public service for victims and survivors.<\/p>\n

Lights will beam into the sky above Bondi Pavilion, where thousands of flowers and tributes have been laid since the tragedy.<\/p>\n

\"BBL<\/p>\n

Australians across the nation have stood in solidarity with the Jewish community. (Jono Searle\/AAP PHOTOS)<\/p>\n

Fifteen people were killed when Sajid Akram, 50, and his son Naveed, 24, opened fire on a crowd of Jewish faithful gathered to celebrate Hanukkah at Bondi Beach.<\/p>\n

In a matter of minutes the pair, believed to have undergone terrorist training overseas, unleashed a hail of more than 100 bullets into the terrified gathering.<\/p>\n

When their weapons eventually fell silent, the stench of gunpowder hung heavy over Australia’s most famous beach.<\/p>\n

Their victims, who laid dead or dying, included 10-year-old Matilda, elderly Holocaust survivors Alexander Kleytman and Marika Pogany, and rabbis Yaakov Levitan and Eli Schlanger.<\/p>\n

Also killed were Frenchman Dan Elkaya, 50-year-old Adam Smyth, 61-year-old Peter Meagher, Reuven Morrison, 62, Tibor Weitzen, 78, and five others.<\/p>\n

The elder Akram was shot dead by police.<\/p>\n

As Australians mourn the victims, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese pledged the anti-Semitic terrorists will not divide the nation.<\/p>\n

People are being asked to light a candle and place it in their front window, before observing a minute’s silence at 6.47pm AEDT.<\/p>\n

“(It’s) 60 seconds carved out from the noise of daily life, dedicated to the 15 Australians who should be with us today,” Mr Albanese said.<\/p>\n

“It will be a significant event for our nation.”<\/p>\n

\"Free<\/p>\n

NSW will push through laws banning hateful symbols from being displayed in the streets or at home. (Dean Lewins\/AAP PHOTOS)<\/p>\n

Planning for a formal, public service for victims and survivors is under way but will not go ahead until the new year.<\/p>\n

Come Monday, the NSW government will rush new laws through parliament to ban hateful symbols, including flags of al-Qaeda, al-Shabaab, Boko Haram, Hamas, Hezbollah and Islamic State, from being displayed in the streets or at home.<\/p>\n

Police will also get greater powers to compel people suspected of committing an offence during public events to remove face coverings.<\/p>\n

Hateful slogans, which Premier Chris Minns said included the chant “globalise the intifada”, would also be banned.<\/p>\n

He and federal Opposition Leader Sussan Ley threw their support behind a royal commission to understand how the terrorist attack happened and ensure it never happens again.<\/p>\n

\"Lifesavers<\/p>\n

Bondi lifesavers lined the beach on Saturday in silent tribute to the victims of the terror attack. (Bianca De Marchi\/AAP PHOTOS)<\/p>\n

“We’ve got bits and pieces of the jigsaw puzzle here but we don’t have the full picture,” Mr Minns said on Saturday.<\/p>\n

Mr Albanese said while he would have more to say about a public inquiry later, he would stand behind any decisions made by the NSW government.<\/p>\n

Hundreds of volunteers stood hand-in-hand with Bondi’s world-famous lifeguards on Saturday, lining almost the kilometre-long shoreline in red and yellow, punctuated by the lifeguards in blue in silent tribute.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"One week since terror descended on the shores of Bondi Beach, Australians will remember the 15 lives lost…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":360881,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[2324,64,63,9461,89155,191799,26763,196690,44,37650,192381,51905,196689],"class_list":["post-360880","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-anthony-albanese","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-australians","tag-bondi-beach","tag-bondi-pavilion","tag-jewish-community","tag-national-day-of-mourning","tag-news","tag-public-service","tag-sajid-akram","tag-terror","tag-victims-and-survivors"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/360880","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=360880"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/360880\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/360881"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=360880"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=360880"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=360880"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}