Bondi Beach: from Sanctuary to Memorial

Australia was my home for the first 25 years of my life. I grew up in North Bondi, in the heavily Jewish Eastern Suburbs. My parents like many of their generation were Holocaust survivors. My mother arrived in Australia in 1949 with her parents and brother; my father arrived a year later on December 31, 1950. They met on the steps leading down to the sand at Bondi Beach, a part of the beach front affectionately known as Little Jerusalem, the steps were known as the Jerusalem steps. A year or so after they met, my father proposed at that very spot, at the top of the stairs across from Bondi’s promenade. For my family, Bondi Beach has always been a place of magic, romance and friendship.

The magic was violently stripped away on Sunday, December 14, 2025, when a brutal terrorist act left 15 innocents murdered, more than 40 hospitalised and an entire Jewish community traumatized. Beachgoers of all faiths witnessed scenes that will never be unseen. In less than half an hour of pure evil, Sydney’s most famous beach lost its innocence, not just for me, but for countless others.

I made Israel my home over 40 years ago, but Australia has always remained a big part of my who I am. I remember arriving in Sydney for a family visit a few years ago, and being asked by Passport Control, “you an expat?” The word stung, “Actually” I replied, “I am still very much a patriot, I just no longer live here”.

Each return visit to Sydney felt like stepping backwards into a familiar photograph. Some buildings were new, some people come and others gone, but Australia was still the laid-back country I had grown up loving. Like many countries around the world, Australia underwent a profound change during Covid. As the Pandemic intensified so did government restrictions. Lock downs, curfews, mask mandates, and social distancing became norm. Draconian measures were introduced in March 2020 and only began easing October 2022.  Life never fully returned to what it had been before, but people slowly started to reclaim their freedom.

Immigration since the 1970s had significantly altered Australia’s demographic makeup. With each visit, I noticed larger tracts of Southwestern Sydney becoming areas people quietly warned you to avoid. My own family and friends are concentrated in the Eastern Suburbs and in the North over the Harbour Bridge, so neither they nor I were directly affected by those changes to the demographics.

And then came October 7, 2023.

Yes, the sails of the Opera House were quickly illuminated in blue and white, displaying Israel’s flag. But just as quickly, chilling and threatening voices rose from those same Southwestern Suburbs. On October 9, less than 2 days from the atrocities in southern Israel, demonstrations erupted. Israel was still licking its wounds, counting the massacred, and beginning to tend to its wounded. Thousands marched through the CBD towards the Opera House screaming the most atrocious aggressive and intimidating slogans. These were not protests aimed at Israel; they were hunting Jew! Federal, State and Local governments responded with little more than hollow statements, platitudes and performative concern.

Seeing there were no consequences, the demonstrations escalated. The marches grew louder and more menacing. They began encroaching on Jewish neighbourhoods. In Melbourne a demonstration was deliberately held on a Friday night outside of one the city’s largest Synagogues, timed to coincide with worshippers leaving services. Synagogues were firebombed, a preschool was targeted in a similar way, a truck containing explosives with plans to attack Synagogues in Sydney was discovered. Hard and clear evidence emerged of incitement by local figures and foreign actors, including Iran. But again, political leaders spoke but no action was taken.

As a result, Jewish communal life in Australia now operates under unprecedented security. Community events are advertised without disclosing locations. Ordinary activities require extraordinary precautions. A reality that developed in plain sight.

And then, on the first day of Chanuka, the inevitable occurred. A father and son, radicalised within their community and reportedly trained in a terrorist camp in the Philippines, opened fire on Jews who had gathered to celebrate the first day of the Festival of Lights, they sprayed bullets from their long-barreled hunting rifles on innocent civilians.

The warning signs had been unmistakable. The writing was on the wall for all to see. Yet once again, political leaders expressed shock and outrage while offering nothing of substance. A gutless and witless PM didn’t even have the moral fortitude to attend the first funeral, that of Rabbi Eli Shlanger, a 41-year-old husband, father of 5, and a leading light in the Sydney Jewish community. Mr. Albanese claimed he had not been invited, a petty and unworthy excuse. Leadership demands moral courage, especially in moments of national shame.

Responsibility lays firmly at the feet of the father and son, those locally who radicalised them, and the politicians that did nothing to calm the country, and in fact helped fan the flames.

Australia could recover from this, although I am extremely doubtful that Australia’s current leadership have either the will or capacity to do so.

Whenever I arrived in Sydney, Bondi Beach was one of my first stops. It was a place of solitude, memory, and peace. After the long trip from Israel, standing by or in the surf as it hit the white sand restored me. It reconnected me to my youth and to the magic and romance Bondi represented for my family.

Bondi Beach will remain on my list of places to visit. But from now on, it will no longer be a sanctuary. It will be a memorial.