Australian Jewish community welcomes PM’s decision to set up sweeping probe into Bondi Beach massacre

After Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said today that the country will form a royal commission inquiry into the mass terror shooting that killed 15 people at a Hanukkah event at Sydney’s Bondi Beach, the main body of the Australian Jewish community says it welcomes the decision.

Australia’s 120,000-strong Jewish community has long complained that Albanese hasn’t done enough to protect them from rising antisemitism following the October 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israel, and that his ideological opposition to Israel has emboldened pro-Palestinian activists to target Jewish institutions. Occasional statements of support from Albanese after the many attacks on Jews in the past two years have frequently been met with cynicism.

This time, the Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ) says the government has made “the right decision.”

“On behalf of the Australian Jewish community, we welcome the Prime Minister’s announcement,” ECAJ president Daniel Aghion KC says in a statement. He adds that ECAJ intends to cooperate with the commission, and that he hopes it will provide “an honest examination of government policies and the conduct and policies of key institutions and figures in major sectors of our society” in allowing antisemitism to thrive over the past two years.