By Helen Reynolds
Australia is grieving.
The mass killing at Bondi has shaken Sydney and stunned the nation. In the immediate aftermath, there should have been space for mourning, solidarity, and quiet reflection. Instead, the noise arrived almost instantly – loud, cruel, and deeply familiar.
Within hours, social media filled with demands that Muslims be deported, that whole communities be treated as suspects, that fear be repackaged as policy. As if a tragedy can be explained by pointing at a faith followed peacefully by more than a billion people worldwide, including hundreds of thousands of Australians who are our neighbours, colleagues, doctors, teachers, and friends.
This reflex is not about safety. It never is.
It is about finding someone convenient to blame before the bodies are even buried.
Australia has walked this road before. We know where it leads. Collective punishment does not prevent violence – it multiplies it. Bigotry does not heal trauma – it extends it. And scapegoating minorities in moments of national shock is not strength; it is moral cowardice.
As if this wasn’t enough, a second chorus joined in from overseas. Americans – many of them – took it upon themselves to lecture Australia about gun laws. According to them, our strict firearms regulations “don’t work”.
This claim is not just wrong. It is offensive.
Australia reformed its gun laws after Port Arthur. The result was not theoretical, ideological, or symbolic. It was measurable and human: mass shootings largely disappeared. Gun deaths fell. Families were spared the kind of routine horror that now barely registers as news in the United States.
To be told, in the wake of fresh Australian bloodshed, that these laws “failed” is grotesque. What the critics really mean is that such laws would never survive the political system they are trapped in – a system paralysed by gun lobbies, identity politics, and a mythology that mistakes firepower for freedom.
Australia chose fewer coffins.
America chose excuses.
There is a deeper sickness at work here, one that connects the Islamophobia at home with the gun evangelism abroad. It is the refusal to accept evidence when it conflicts with ideology. The refusal to sit with complexity. The demand that every tragedy confirm a pre-existing narrative.
Violence is not a religion.
Grief is not a policy platform.
And shock is not permission to abandon our values.
If there is anything to be defended in moments like this, it is not borders, weapons, or slogans. It is the fragile idea that a decent society responds to horror with humanity – not hate, not smugness, and not lies dressed up as certainty.
Australia can grieve without turning on itself.
We have done it before.
We must do it again.
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What we know is that a man and his adult son, of Middle Eastern heritage and possibly Palestinian, with a deep hatred of Jews planned this slaughter with high velocity guns, six of which were legally registered to the father.
We know that a heroically brave unarmed man tackled one of the shooters and stripped him of his gun and in the process was shot (in the arm and hand) by the other gunman. This brave man is Ahmed al Ahmed a fruit shop owner and of Arab heritage, possibly Lebanese. We wish him well for a speedy recovery and thank him for illustrating to the world that Australia is not an antisemitic rabble : I salute Mr Ahmed for his bravery – relatives say that he knows nothing about guns but it’s evident he knows a lot about humanity and putting the wellbeing of others ahead of his own safety.
Bibi Netanyahu took no time in condemning the Albanese government for not taking a stronger line on those of Arab heritage [who, incidentally, are also semitic peoples] living in Australia. Perhaps these outbreaks of violence could be tamed if Netanyahu and his acolytes really demonstrated that they have a wish for peace in their homeland and with their neighbours in Gaza and the Westbank [and Lebanon, Syria and Iran]!
Terry: Perfect, my thoughts exactly.
My immediate reaction was as follows: One gun licence per adult – one gun per licence, no exceptions.
One person cannot fire more than one gun at a time, let alone six.
Whereas authorities cannot alter a persons’ belief they can limit that persons’ access to guns. National regulation/legislation is required now.
The reactions are unsurprising,given the widespread shallowness of our political ‘leadership’.Ley comes out immediately, blaming Albanese, as are others.Also unsurprisingly,Netanyahu,who should be held responsible because of the actions of his evil Zionist regime.He has done more to foment antisemitism than any other person on earth.
Thank you Helen Reynolds.
Thanks Helen and Terry, you both make very important points.
One point, many Australians and organizations were calling for our gun laws to be revisited well before this slaughter. Australia apparently has more guns floating around now than it did at the time of Port Arthur massacre. 3D printers are able to manufacture lethal guns.
Surely, looking at revisiting our gun laws was overdue years ago.
Im sorry (and I dont support or condone what occured yesterday), but what does the Australian Zionist/Jewish lobby thinks was going to happen when they keep blatantly and immorally supporting Israevils genocide and Ethnic cleansing. I for one and I know I speak for many Australians who are sick and tired of watching just over 100,000 jews (Thats right they are a tiny, tiny minority!) dictating to the Australian Government and the media! As for Netanyahu’s comment this morning blaming Australia’s recognition of Palestine, now there is a man who needs to reap what he sows and richly deserves a bullet!
We need to look at the authority who licensed six guns to this shooter. Why on earth could he possibly “need” six guns – in suburbia? That’s where we must start, not condemning Middle Eastern people, as people like Pauline Hanson, likely will. Then we must talk to Albanese about his rhetoric supporting Israel, in particular, his comments about “shared values” because ordinary Australians certainly do not share the values of Zionists or the Trump Administration whhich supports the Israeli genocide. I can only imagine how much anger this causes those who share religion and values, with Palestinians.
Thank you, Helen Reynolds and Harry Lime, for promptly setting out this important reaction.
Yes, this massacre was a terrible crime, and one of anti-semitism.
But now, Netanyahu is using it to blame Prime Minister Albanese for showing compassion and respect for the Palestinian people.
I feel great sympathy for all those good Jews, who also show compassion and respect for Palestinians and their cause for their home. It’s all too easy now to confuse this horrible Zionist genocide in Gaza and the West Bank with what is the genuine Jewish religion.
I’ve been following international and domestic reporting of this terrorist attack.
Too many groups are using it to drive the wedge or push their narrow bigotry.
• it is true that there are some in the US that are using this to seek to demonstrate the failure of Australian gun laws. They seem unaware that the homicide rate in the US is about 6 per 100,000. In Australia it is 0.85 per 100,000. Our homicide rate doesn’t need to head towards the US.
• terrorist attacks are increasing. In the past those inclined to become violent psychopaths and mass murderers were isolated and their inclinations were suppressed.
Now it seems they are able to attach themselves to an extremist political or religious ideology, and develop the self image that their violence and murder is ideological and righteous.
They can form reinforcing interest groups.
The events of Bondi demonstrate that being both a psychopath and a self righteous religious zealot is a serious problem.
Hi Thomas Brooke,
I suspect that we would agree that worldwide anti-Israeli sentiment is a result of Israel’s genocide against the Palestinian people, and whilst I share your sentiments in regard to influence exerted in Australia wholeheartedly, words are important and I would take issue with two things.
First, there are people of Jewish faith in Australia who have consistently been a part of the anti-genocide protests and movements. The Jewish Council of Australia is one such group, they have opposed the lawfare and anti-protest legislation that Labor has tried to introduce. To tar all Australian Jews with the same brush is just plain wrong.
As an aside, Norman Finkelstein has long been a critic of Israel and he has come to the opinion that even the use of ‘Zionist’ is a mistake as there is no agreement on what it means, instead, he believes it is more useful to talk of pro-Israeli support in terms of ‘supremacists’.
Second, ” richly deserves a bullet”, let’s not make a martyr out of a psychopath; the proper way to deal with war criminals is in court. Netanyahu deserves to be standing in the dock at the Hague for war crimes, as do Biden, Trump, Mertz and Starmer. Will it happen, no, because the ICC has been crippled by US sanctions and Microsoft shutting down their computer services. The Albanese government, Albanese, Wong and Dreyfus in particular, have given tacit approval of the undermining of the ICC through its silence in defending the ICC, whilst at the same time supporting Israel and the USA. They deserve thorough condemnation.
Gonggongche. You probably need to read what I said again.
1. I did not “tar all jews with the same brush” I said the “zionist/Jewish lobby groups”.
2. I am on the mailing list of the Jewish Council of Australia.
3. I am also on the mailing list of Norman Finkelstien.
4. As you said Netanyahu will never stand trial, then a bullet is the only solution. Live by the sword…die by the sword. I think half of Israevil (and at least half the world) would breath a sigh of relief if Bibi, Smotich, Ben-Gavir and the West Bank militia were taken out, just like they do to others.
Thomas Brookes
Rather than infer that I hadn’t read your post carefully, perhaps you should look at how poorly worded your post was.
How did what you said exclude the likes of the Jewish Council of Australia from your criticism? They are a Jewish lobby group – the difference being that they lobby the government to not bring in anti-protest laws for one thing.
How does ‘Zionist/Jewish lobby’ exclude them from your criticism?
As for whatever mailing list anyone on here claims, is not verifiable, and irrelevant. It is the words posted here that matter, not what people claim to do or read.
What Israel and the USA are doing is undermining International law and replacing it with ‘might is right’. Your don’t worry about International law, ‘live by the sword, die by the sword’ simply acts according to the same principle ‘might is right’.
Gonggongche My post was not “poorly worded”. You assumed, just like you have done again, with your “might is right” comment. If you just stepped back and realised that you and I are on the same side, instead of trying to pick fault in my post and insult me. On that basis thanks for the invitation to a fight Gonggongche, but I decline.
I believe these are our rules in TAS, prepared to be corrected
Guns for farmers are locked in an approved safe in an approved place on the property, we have a single shot rifle and a 2 barrel shotgun as we live in a rural area and have used these for feral animals, occasional snakes and euthanasia for week or ill animals.
Guns for target shooters are kept at the Gun Club – there is no other excuse.
Who needs long arm multi-shot weapons in suburban Sydney ??? Why was this not a red flag for anyone??
Let us keep up the pressure on the Feds to finish off the national registry and standardise gun control laws across the country. NOW
Thomas Brooks, pity you can’t be more introspective yourself!
Two other perspectives that you may find helpful, maybe.
https://michaelwest.com.au/butt-out-of-bondi-netanyahu/
https://johnmenadue.com/post/2025/12/bondi/?