Australian Leaders Criticized Over Lack of Police Presence at Site of Bondi Beach Hanukkah Massacre

Latest Developments

‘Could Have Been a Different Scenario’: Chris Minns, the Premier of the state of New South Wales (NSW) in Australia, is under fire over the reported lack of a significant police presence at the Hanukkah menorah lighting ceremony in Sydney in which 15 people were murdered and dozens wounded in an Islamist terror attack. Minns initially claimed that only two officers had been on duty at the Bondi Beach site, but in a later interview, he raised the number to three, alongside a further 20 officers in the wider area. “If the cops had put riot squad cars on the road near the bridge and in the beach car park — [it] could have been a very different scenario,” one of the wounded attendees said.
Sajid Akram Granted Gun License Despite Investigation Into Son Naveed: NSW Police Commissioner Mal Lanyon confirmed that the guns used in the terrorist attack were legally registered to one of the two gunmen, Sajid Akram. Akram was granted the license to own firearms in 2023, four years after his son, Naveed Akram, the second gunman, was investigated by the Australian Security Intelligence Organization over his close ties to a Sydney-based ISIS cell. Sajid Akram’s previous firearms license application in 2015 had lapsed after he failed to provide a photograph, but he successfully reapplied in 2020. Following the massacre, the Australian Joint Counter Terrorism Team found two ISIS flags in the Akrams’ car. According to senior counterterrorism officials, the pair reportedly traveled to the Philippines to receive “military-style” training with an ISIS-affiliated terrorist organization.
Gun Reform Debate a ‘Diversion’: In the wake of the attack, both Minns and Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese stated they were preparing legislation to “make gun laws tougher” in NSW and Australia. Former Australian Prime Minister John Howard slammed Albanese, stating that the premier’s push for gun reform was a “big attempt at diversion,” before going on to criticize Albanese for his failure “to do enough by words and in deeds … to demonstrate his detestation of antisemitism.” Lynda Ben-Menashe, president of the National Council of Jewish Women in Australia, said, “Over the past two years, antisemitism has been rising by the month, and the government has not listened to our pleas. When there is no visible consequence to incitement, violence always ensues.”

FDD Expert Response

“Whether there were two or three police officers in the immediate vicinity of the attack is a red herring. The fact remains that the law enforcement presence at the Bondi Beach site was woefully inadequate. The Australian government has failed to take meaningful action against inflammatory anti-Zionist and antisemitic rhetoric, and it has failed to protect Australian Jews from the consequences of that rhetoric.” — Ben Cohen, Senior Analyst and Rapid Response Director

“The same political outlook in Australia and elsewhere in the West that puts Israel under a microscope turns a blind eye to the dangers facing Jewish communities. In their quest to eradicate imagined crimes of Israel, these Western do-gooders are enabling real crimes against local Jewish populations. Attempts to draw false distinctions between antisemitism and anti-Zionism won’t prevent terrorists from turning Sydney’s white sands red.” — David May, Research Manager and Senior Research Analyst

“It’s striking that the terrorists named Davao, in Mindanao, as their final destination in the Philippines. They would have known that traveling to parts of western Mindanao carries a maximum penalty of 10 years’ imprisonment under Australian federal law because they have been designated as areas of terrorist activity. It adds to the catalogue of Australian security failures that they did not register the travel of Sajid and Naveed Akram to a location where they could rendezvous with other terrorists.” — Edmund Fitton-Brown, Senior Fellow