Two alleged gunmen who opened fire at a Jewish Hanukkah gathering at Bondi Beach were a father and son, police said Monday, as Australia mourned the nation’s deadliest mass shooting in nearly three decades.
Authorities identified the pair in local media as 50-year-old Sajid Akram and his 24-year-old son, Naveed Akram. Police said the father was killed at the scene, bringing the confirmed death toll to 16, while the son remained in critical condition in hospital. Officials have described the attack as a targeted antisemitic incident.
About 1,000 people had gathered for the event in a small park off the beach. Witnesses said the shooting, on a hot evening when the beach was crowded, lasted roughly ten minutes and sent hundreds running across the sand and into nearby streets. Videos from the scene showed what appeared to be a bolt-action rifle and a shotgun being fired.
Forty people remained in hospital, including two police officers in a serious but stable condition. The victims ranged in age from 10 to 87.
A bystander seen on video tackling and disarming an armed man has been hailed a hero. Broadcaster 7News named him as 43-year-old fruit shop owner Ahmed al Ahmed, who was shot twice and underwent surgery. A fundraising page for him had raised more than A$350,000 ($233,000) by Monday afternoon.
Police did not formally name the shooters but said the father had held a firearms licence since 2015 and owned six licensed weapons. Home Minister Tony Burke said the father arrived in Australia in 1998 on a student visa; the son was Australian-born. New South Wales Police Commissioner Mal Lanyon said investigators were still working through the pair’s backgrounds and knew “very little” at this stage.
Residents described chaotic scenes. Bondi local Morgan Gabriel, 27, said she was heading to a nearby cinema when she heard what she thought were fireworks before people began running. “I sheltered about six or seven. Two of them were actually my close friends… everyone was just trying to get away,” she said, describing Bondi as unusually quiet and solemn the next morning.
A makeshift memorial with flowers and Israeli and Australian flags was set up at the Bondi pavilion, and an online condolence book was created. Police and private Jewish security guards patrolled as mourners paid respects. Authorities said they were confident only two attackers were involved; a police cordon remained around the suspects’ home in Bonnyrigg, about 36 km west of Sydney’s CBD.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese visited Bondi to lay flowers and condemned the shooting as “an act of pure evil, an act of antisemitism, an act of terrorism on our shores in an iconic Australian location.” He urged Australians to light a candle in solidarity with the Jewish community and said world leaders, including U.S. President Donald Trump and French President Emmanuel Macron, had offered condolences.
Sunday’s attack came amid a series of antisemitic incidents in Australia since the start of Israel’s war in Gaza in October 2023. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he had warned Albanese that Australia’s support for Palestinian statehood could fuel antisemitism. In August, Australia accused Iran of directing at least two antisemitic attacks and expelled Tehran’s ambassador.
Mass shootings are rare in Australia, which has strict gun laws, making Sunday’s violence the country’s worst since the 1996 Port Arthur massacre in Tasmania, when 35 people were killed. Rabbi Mendel Kastel, whose brother-in-law Eli Schlanger was among those killed, urged unity and support for the community, saying they would “step up at a time like this… and we will get through this.”
A local woman, who gave only her first name, Danielle, said she had rushed to collect her daughter from a nearby bar mitzvah venue after hearing the shooting, encountering bodies on the ground. The attack prompted increased security for Hanukkah events in major cities worldwide, including Berlin, London and New York.
Australia’s Jewish community numbers about 150,000 in a nation of 27 million, with around one-third living in Sydney’s eastern suburbs, including Bondi. The wider context of regional and international violence—including the October 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israel and the subsequent Gaza war, which Gaza health authorities say has killed more than 70,000 people—has contributed to heightened tensions and a string of antisemitic incidents in recent months.
