The grandparents of 10-year-old Matilda, who was killed during the Bondi Beach mass shooting, grieve at the floral memorial in Sydney on Tuesday.Jeremy Piper/Reuters
There was darkness, and horror, on Bondi Beach on Sunday. Two gunmen saw hundreds of Jewish Australians gathered to celebrate the start of Hanukkah, and did not see fellow human beings, but only a cluster of targets.
Fifteen people were murdered in Australia’s worst terror attack, ranging in age from a 10 year-old-girl to an 87-year-old Holocaust survivor. Thirty-eight more people were injured. Not all of the victims are Jewish, and the investigation is ongoing, but the hateful motivation of the two attackers is clear enough. Through their radicalized eyes, they saw the killing of Jewish Australians as part of the fight against Israel, and against Jews, wherever they live.
And if anyone was still unclear as to what the chants heard in countless rallies in Canada and elsewhere to “globalize the intifada” mean, the answer is to be found in the carnage at Bondi Beach. The two gunmen heard and heeded the call to intifada.
There is darkness, so much as to nearly overwhelm. But there were also flickers of light in that darkness. Boris Gurman, 69, and Sofia Gurman, 61, tried to disarm one of the gunmen before the killing spree began. The couple, a month away from celebrating their 35th wedding anniversary, died in the attempt. But they fought back against darkness.
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Ahmed al-Ahmed fought, too. Out to get a coffee, the fruit shop owner saw one of the gunmen. Before he set off, Mr. al-Ahmed, who once served in the security forces of his native Syria, reportedly told his cousin that he expected to die. But still, he went.
The world has seen the video of Mr. al-Ahmed, crouched behind a car, then charging the gunman, wrestling a firearm from the murderer’s hands and then pointing the weapon at him. Mr. al-Ahmed was shot in the arm, but undoubtedly saved many lives. He stood against darkness.
So what about the rest of us? What will we do to fight the growing contagion of antisemitism that has festered for centuries, but increased in virulence in the last two years?
That fight must start by saying clearly and loudly: our Jewish neighbours are not responsible for the actions of the Netanyahu government or for the death and destruction in Gaza. To say or act otherwise is an explicit act of antisemitism.
Police say the alleged gunmen who opened fire at a Hanukkah celebration in Sydney's Bondi Beach had traveled to Mindanao in the Philippines last month, as investigators probe ties to extremist networks.
Reuters
There is much to criticize the Israeli government, including on the scale of destruction and civilian deaths, on the lapses that allowed Hamas to launch the Oct. 7 attack, on the decision earlier this year to restrict food shipments. Every decent person is horrified by the images of dead civilians in Gaza. But every decent person should also recognize that Hamas started this war and used the lives of those civilians to wage (an all too successful) propaganda war against Israel.
The groups that march in Jewish-Canadian neighbourhoods, as was the case last month in Toronto, are not mere protestors trying to convince their fellow citizens. They are engaged in an act of aggression and intimidation, an echo of the Ku Klux Klan marching through a Black neighbourhood. They are fueling antisemitism.
Holding regular rallies that demand the eradication of Israel, make unproven assertions of genocide and thirst for a global intifada is not an act of mere protest. It is antisemitic, it fuels radicalism and it clears a path for violence. Demand an intifada often enough, and you will get one.
The right to protest, even in a loathsome way, is a constitutional right. But there are laws that can be, and should be, enforced more vigorously. Canada has a hate-speech law on the books. Crown prosecutors should use it, with particular attention to section 319(1) of the Criminal Code, which prohibits the public incitement of hatred. And police need to abandon their preoccupation with maintaining public order at all costs. A deescalation strategy does not make sense when dealing with protestors looking to assert control of the streets.
But there is only so much that politicians, the police and courts can do. Every Canadian, too, bears a responsibility to fight the darkness of antisemitism. This is not a saccharine call for thoughts and prayers to the Jewish-Canadian community. Action is needed.
Do not let antisemitic statements go unchallenged. Demand the prosecution of those who incite hate. Join your fellow citizens and make that case directly to those who peddle hate in the streets. Make sure that Jewish-Canadians know they are not alone. Fight against the growing darkness, while that fight can still be won.