Israel’s President Isaac Herzog said Monday people of all faiths will “overcome this evil” as he laid a wreath to commemorate victims of a shooting that killed 15 people at a Jewish festival on Sydney’s Bondi Beach.
The head of state paid homage under rain and grey skies to those killed in the December 14 attack as he embarked on a tightly secured, four-day visit to console the Jewish Australian community.
“The bonds between good people of all faiths and all nations will continue to hold strong in the face of terror, violence and hatred,” he said in a ceremony outside the beachside Bondi Pavilion.
“We shall overcome this evil together.”
Herzog said he had laid two stones from Jerusalem at Bondi Beach “in sacred memory of the victims”.
He welcomed “positive steps” to fight antisemitism by the Australian government, which has introduced tougher gun and hate crime laws since the attack.
But the Israeli president told reporters that he shared people’s frustrations about a rise in antisemitism “all over the world”.
– ‘In good will’ –
Among the victims of the Bondi Beach shooting were an 87-year-old Holocaust survivor, a couple who confronted one of the gunmen, and a 10-year-old girl, Matilda, who was described at her funeral as a “ray of sunshine”.
Alleged Bondi Beach shooter Sajid Akram, 50, was shot and killed by police during the attack. An Indian national, he entered Australia on a visa in 1998.
His 24-year-old son Naveed, an Australian-born citizen who remains in prison, has been charged with terrorism and 15 murders.
Pro-Palestinian activists have called for rallies against Herzog’s visit, protesting Israel’s alleged “genocide” in Gaza and demanding Herzog’s arrest for comments that allegedly incited genocide.
“I have come here in good will,” Herzog said.
“These demonstrations, in most cases, what you hear and see comes to undermine and delegitimise our right — my nation’s right, the nation which I am the head of state of — of its mere existence.”
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese urged people to be respectful of the reason for Herzog’s visit, saying he would join the president to visit the families of those killed at Bondi Beach.
– Protests –
“In Australia, I think people want innocent lives to be protected, whether it be Israeli or Palestinian, but they want something else as well — they don’t want conflict brought here,” he told reporters ahead of the visit.
Authorities have promised an “extremely large” police deployment for a pro-Palestinian rally that organisers have called in Sydney’s city centre.
Police say protesters have so far rejected their request to move the evening rally from the city’s Town Hall to a nearby park because of concerns about the venue’s size.
Local media say the rally’s organisers have also launched a legal appeal against the state government’s declaration that Herzog’s Sydney visit is a “major event”, which gives police greater powers to control demonstrations.
The UN’s Independent International Commission of Inquiry found last year that Herzog was liable for prosecution for inciting genocide after he said all Palestinians — “an entire nation” — were responsible for the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023.
Israel has “categorically” rejected the inquiry’s report, describing it as “distorted and false” and calling for the body’s abolition.
Many Jewish Australians have welcomed Herzog’s trip.
“His visit will lift the spirits of a pained community,” said Alex Ryvchin, co-chief executive of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry, the community’s peak body.
But some in the community disagreed, with the progressive Jewish Council of Australia saying he is not welcome because of his alleged role in the “ongoing destruction of Gaza”.
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