Australia

The Bondi murders painted a picture constituted out of the contrast between shade and light. This was the chiaroscuro massacre. But, perhaps because we have become desensitized by endless dark descriptions of mass killings over the years, our attention was as much on the moments of brightness on that Sydney beach: the onlookers who grappled with the shooters, the lifeguards who sprinted towards danger, those who shielded strangers with their own bodies. These acts of heroism seemed all the more remarkable because of all we have been led to believe about how people act in emergencies. This can be summarized in one word: panic. When the going gets tough, ordinary

After four days of looking like a rabbit in the headlights, embattled Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, finally started to act like a national leader willing to do what’s right. Yesterday, Labor’s Albanese announced his government’s response to a plan to combat anti-Semitism proposed by his hand-picked special envoy on anti-Semitism, Jewish community leader Jillian Segal. Albanese has had Segal’s report since July. His response yesterday, which effectively accepted the envoy’s 13 recommendations, was tardy but substantial. Most importantly, the Australian government accepted the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s (IHRA) definition of anti-Semitism – a definition that boils down simply to hatred towards Jews, without qualification – as the basis of

It’s been three days since the jihad against innocent Jews at Sydney’s Bondi beach. A nation’s grief is swiftly turning to anger and Australia’s prime minister is floundering. As more is learned about the father-and-son killers who took 15 lives and wounded many more, questions are piling up. How did the father enter the country? How did security agencies lose track of the son, who not only imbibed his father’s Jew hate, but may have been further radicalized by reportedly studying with one of Sydney’s most notorious Islamist hate preachers? How did they manage to go to a militant area of the Philippines as recently as a month ago? How