Australia mourns youngest Bondi Beach shooting victim as PM Albanese vows to stamp out hatred
SYDNEY: Australia’s prime minister vowed to stamp out extremism Thursday as the nation mourned of the Bondi Beach shooting, a 10-year-old girl remembered as “our little ray of sunshine.”
Father-and-son gunmen are accused of firing into crowds at a beachside Jewish festival Prime Minister Anthony Albanese promised a sweeping crackdown to banish the “evil of antisemitism from our society.”
“Australians are shocked and angry. I am angry. It is clear we need to do more to combat this evil scourge,” he told reporters.
This included new powers to target extremist preachers and to refuse or cancel visas for those who spread hate and division.
Australia would develop a regime for listing organisations with leaders who engage in hate speech, heSerious vilification” based on race would become a federal offence.
As the prime minister spoke, mourners gathered for the funeral of 10-year-old Matilda, the youngest victim killed in the attack.
“Matilda is our little ray of sunshine,” said the rabbi leading the service, reading a message from her school.
“She is genuinely the most kind, caring and compassionate young girl, who brightened everyone’s day with her radiant smile and infectious laugh.”
Mourners clutched bouquets of lilies as they filed into Sydney’s Chevra Kadisha Memorial Hall, a Jewish funeral home responsible forMatilda’s family — who have asked media not to publish their last name — left Ukraine to settle in Australia.
“I couldn’t imagine I would lose my daughter here. It’s just a nightmare,” mother Valentyna told reporters ahead of the funeral. Her father, Michael, said they chose Matilda’s name as a nod to Australia, where the beloved folk song “Waltzing Matilda” is sung as an unofficial national anthem.
“We came here from Ukraine, and Matilda was our firstborn here in Australia,” he said earlier this week.
“And I thought that Matilda was the most Australian name that could ever exist. So just remember. Remember her name.”The attack has revived allegations that Australia is dragging its feet in the fight against antisemitism.
“When words and hatred are left untouched, it leads to violence,” said survivor Arsen Ostrovsky, wearing a thick gauze pad to cover the wound where a bullet grazed his skull.
“We saw the manifestation of that on Sunday.”
Government envoy for antisemitism Jillian Segal said Australia stood at a crossroads. “Not only for our community, but for fighting antisemitism around the world,” she told reporters.Australian police are investigating whether the pair met with Islamist extremists during a visit to the Philippines weeks before the shooting.
Hotel staff said the duo barely left their rooms during a nearly month-long visit to the restive Mindanao region, which has a long history of Islamist insurgencies. “They weren’t approachable like other foreigners,” night desk manager Angelica Ytang, 20, told AFP.Australia’s leaders have agreed to toughen laws that allowed his father Sajid to own six guns.
The Bondi Beach attack is the deadliest mass shooting since 35 people were killed in the 1996 Port Arthur massacre. That shooting sparked sweeping reform of Australia’s gun laws.
However, in recent years authorities have documented a steady rise in privately owned firearms.
“Other foreigners usually chat with me, but they didn’t.”