Australia's worst mass shooting since '96 at Hanukkah event

Post Reply New Topic

Australia is now on my list of countries I won't travel to.

Not sure why?
https://www.timeout.com/australia/news/ ... -us-120825

we have only had two mass shootings in our entire history
- Port Arthur tasmania - 1996 (30 years ago)
- Bondi beach Sydney - 2025.

Given only Port Arthur involved tourists (not targeted at locals) I'd hazard a guess Australia is very very safe for foreigners.

How about mass stabbings and other forms of violent murders that arent gun-related?

If we are talking about tourists then Australia is on par with New Zealand and Scandinavia for safety in relation safety from petty crime, theft and scams. Infact if you stick to hotels, guided tours and tourist paths you are almost 100% guaranteed to be safe.

But don't take my word for it, feel free to watch Australian travel vlogs. Of course if you choose to do backpacking, shared hostels and hitchhike or look for cheap services via "back alley" deals then risks run a little higher but doing such foolish things is risky anywhere in the world.

99.95% of complaints about Australia revolve around
- everything is so expensive
- Australia has dangerous critters (this reputation is based on tv shows but completely false)
- Nobody told me Australian summers are so hot

uthorities in Britain and Australia are tightening restrictions on pro-Palestinians protests in response to the Islamic State-inspired Bondi Beach massacre targeting a Jewish gathering that killed 15 people.

In New South Wales, the Australian state where the deadly attack on a Hanukkah celebration took place, police will be granted expanded powers to shut down unauthorized protests, while tougher hate speech laws will be introduced, including a proposed ban on the slogan “globalize the intifada.”

The move comes shortly after U.K. police arrested two people in London on racially aggravated public order charges for allegedly shouting slogans invoking “intifada” at a pro-Palestinian demonstration. The new restrictions are part of a nationwide policing shift in response to the attack, which has drawn concern from some civil liberties and free-speech advocates.

The Arabic word "intifada" is generally translated as "uprising" and is used to describe two major Palestinian uprisings in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip against Israeli occupation, the first beginning in 1987 and the second in 2000, both characterized by periods of violence as well as nonviolent mass protests.

Supporters say the term “globalize the intifada,” which has been used for years at pro-Palestinian protests worldwide, refers to international solidarity against Israeli occupation.

Israeli officials and some Jewish organizations, however, argue the term carries an inherent call to violence against Israel and that it functions as antisemitic incitement, a dispute that has increasingly led to policing decisions.

NSW Premier Chris Minns said Thursday that the “implications” of pro-Palestinian rallies could be seen in the Bondi attack and, after authorities designated the shooting a terrorist event, he has introduced reforms that would give his government powers to shut down unauthorized protests for three months.

“When you see people marching and showing violent bloody images, images of death and destruction, it’s unleashing something in our community that the organizers of the protest can’t contain,” he said.

Minns on Saturday announced further reforms to hate speech laws that would ban the "globalize the intifada" chant alongside other “hateful comments and statements,” as well as “terrorist symbols such as the ISIS flags.”

In the United Kingdom, London Metropolitan Police and Greater Manchester Police said Wednesday officers would arrest people holding placards and chanting the phrase “globalize the intifada,” directly citing the context of the attack.

n a joint statement after the attack, London and Manchester's law enforcement agencies said: “Violent acts have taken place, the context has changed — words have meaning and consequence. We will act decisively and make arrests.”

The British police forces also referenced an attack at a synagogue in Manchester earlier this year, where two people were killed on Yom Kippur, the holiest day in the Jewish calendar.

Hundreds of people, many of them elderly, according to British Home Office data, have already been arrested at protests in recent months across the U.K. for showing support for Palestine Action, a group that was banned under British terrorism laws after staging actions targeting military facilities and defense firms. The British government said, without providing evidence, that the group had shown willingness "to use violence in pursuit of its cause."

While major Jewish groups have welcomed last week's changes and proposals in the U.K. and Australia, some analysts and opponents of the new measures warn that governments are responding to security fears by collapsing political speech into criminal conduct.

Index on Censorship, a U.K.-based organization advocating for free expression, said police and prosecutors will need to demonstrate that the words “globalize the intifada” are “harmful in and of themselves.”

“Where meaning is genuinely ambiguous, we always argue that the criminal law should tread carefully,” it said in a statement Friday.

Marji Mansfield, 69, a retired financial consultant and grandmother of seven, was carried away in handcuffs by police officers at demonstrations in July and November in London, and faces terrorism charges for expressing support for Palestine Action.

She said she hasn't heard 'globalize the intifada' chanted at rallies, but denied the slogan was an incitement to violence, calling it "a call for liberation" amid Israel's ongoing occupation of Gaza.

"It seems bizarre that our government and the government in Australia are seeking to criminalize words that are saying, 'stop these illegal international crimes against humanity'," she told NBC News.

The U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, warned in July that some measures in the U.K. limiting pro-Palestinian protests appear "at odds with the U.K.’s obligations under international human rights law."

Freedom of expression “has always been vital, but it’s never been absolute," said Mark Stephens, co-chair of the International Bar Association’s Human Rights Institute. "We've always drawn a line at incitement to violence, and so that principle has to adapt in more volatile climates."

The difficulty authorities face, Stephens told NBC News, is that they are taking slogans and criminalizing them "on the grounds that it threatens public safety and the state has a duty to act, but that is an area where reasonable people can and do differ."

From a police perspective "it's becoming a bit of a game of Whac-A-Mole," he added. "If you can't say 'globalize the intifada,' someone will come up with something else which isn't illegal, and that becomes the new phrase du jour."

In Australia, the additional legislation on protests has also sparked debate over how far authorities should go in policing political expression.

“For two years, people have paraded in our streets and universities calling for the intifada to be globalized, a catchphrase which means kill Jews wherever you find them," David Ossip, the president of the NSW Jewish Board of Deputies, said last week.

Some Jewish groups have opposed the move. The Jewish Council of Australia, a progressive group that advocates for "Palestinian freedom," said Thursday in a statement that "policy which points towards universities, the protest movement and migration as the problem will only lead to more demonization."

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese was jeered by the audience at the Sunday Hanukkah candle lighting and vigil for Bondi Beach massacre victims, as the Australian leader faces criticism for measures against antisemitism and calls from the Jewish community for an independent public inquiry.

As New South Wales Jewish Board of Deputies president David Ossip thanked dignitaries for attending the Light Over Darkness commemoration for the Bondi victims, the crowd booed at the mention of Albanese.

Ossip chided the crowd for its expressions of disapproval. In contrast, NSW Premier Chris Minns received a resounding applause and standing ovation when he went to speak, and when his name was mentioned by Ossip for not missing “ a funeral, synagogue service, or opportunity to be with the Jewish community this week.”

The Australian Broadcasting Corporation also reported that Albanese had been jeered at when he arrived at the event, which saw the participation of almost 20.000 people supporting the families and victims.

While Albanese had called for his office to conduct a review into the country’s law enforcement and intelligence agencies that morning, Jewish leaders called for an independent royal commission at the vigil.

Executive Council of Australian Jewry president Daniel Aghion said during his memorial speech the Jewish community had “warned the government of the risk, again and again” after “two years of unrelenting vitriol,” and that now “every level of government from the federal down and every sector of society must take the necessary steps to make us all safe,” including the “necessary step” of a “commonwealth royal commission.”
Ossip also noted that the government had been warned about how rising antisemitism could result in incidents such as last Sunday’s terrorist attack, and how the security arrangements that the Jewish community had to live under as an answer should never have been accepted as the norm.

Australian police say homemade pipe and tennis ball bombs were thrown at a crowd at Bondi Beach before a mass shooting, but failed to detonate, according to court documents released on Monday.

The alleged gunmen had planned the attack for several months and visited the Bondi beachside park for reconnaissance two days prior, said a police fact sheet released by the court.

Pictures included in the police report showed the father and son allegedly training with firearms in an isolated rural part of New South Wales, Australia's most populous state, which includes Sydney.

Police found a video taken in October on one of the gunmen's mobile phones showing them sitting in front of an image of an Islamic State flag and making statements in English about their reasons for the attack, while condemning the acts of Zionists.

Just after 2:00 a.m. on the day of the attack, the men were captured on CCTV video carrying long and bulky items wrapped in blankets from a short-stay rental house in the suburb of Campsie to a car, said the police report.

They later drove to Bondi around 5:00 p.m.

Police believe the items wrapped in the blankets were two single-barreled shotguns, a Beretta rifle, three pipe bombs, a tennis ball bomb, and a large improvised explosive device.

Police allege the men threw the pipe bombs and tennis ball bomb at the crowd in the Bondi park before they began shooting, but the explosive devices did not detonate, according to the statement tendered to the court.

Police said that they later found 3D printed parts for a shotgun component at the Campsie house, bomb making equipment, and copies of the Quran.

The parliament of New South Wales state was recalled on Monday to vote on proposed new laws that would impose major curbs on firearm ownership, ban the display of terror symbols, and restrict protests, following the mass shooting.

The state legislation would cap the number of firearms a person can own at four, or up to 10 for certain groups, such as farmers.

Although Australia has some of the toughest gun control laws in the world after a 1996 shooting that killed 35 people, the Bondi shooting has highlighted what authorities say are gaps.

In New South Wales, there are more than 70 people in the state who own more than 100 guns, a police firearms registry shows. One license holder has 298 guns.

The proposed legislation would also give police more powers to remove face coverings during protests or rallies. The state government has vowed to ban the chant "globalize the intifada," which it says encourages violence in the community.

New South Wales Premier Chris Minns told reporters outside parliament that he expected opposition to the legislation, which includes restrictions on public assemblies in the aftermath of a terrorism event, but said it was needed to keep the community safe.

"We have got a responsibility to knit together our community that comes from different races and religions and places from all over the world. We can do it in a peaceful way," he said.

Communists don't kill Americans or Jewish civilians...

Of course, they just starve and execute their own people which is somehow overlooked by the useful idiots in the West who support them.