‘Depraved Response to a Depraved Act’: Netanyahu Blames Attack on Australia Recognizing Palestine
“This is an atrocious downplaying of real antisemitism at a time when rampant Jew hatred is killing people,” said an American congressional candidate and school shooting survivor.
Health workers move a man on a stretcher to an ambulance after a shooting at Bondi Beach in Sydney, Australia on December 14, 2025.
(Photo by Saeed Khan/AFP via Getty Images)
Jessica Corbett
Dec 14, 2025
COMMON DREAMS
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was swiftly criticized around the world on Sunday for trying to connect a deadly shooting that targeted a Hanukkah celebration at Bondi Beach in Sydney to the Australian government’s decision to recognize Palestinian statehood.
Netanyahu referenced a letter he sent to Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese in August, after Albanese and Foreign Affairs Minister Penny Wong announced the decision, which followed similar moves from Canada, France, and the United Kingdom, amid Israel’s assault on the Gaza Strip, which has been widely condemned as genocide.
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As Netanyahu noted, he wrote to Albanese: “Your call for a Palestinian state pours fuel on the antisemitic fire. It rewards Hamas terrorists. It emboldens those who menace Australian Jews and encourages the Jew hatred now stalking your streets.”
The Israeli leader shared a video and transcript of his commentary on the social media platform X, where Jasper Nathaniel, who reports on the illegally occupied West Bank, called it a “depraved response to a depraved act.”
“Obviously massacring unarmed men, women, and children at a Hanukkah celebration is antisemitic terror,” Nathaniel added in a separate thread. “Just like massacring unarmed men, women, and children in Gaza and the West Bank is anti-Palestinian terror. There are no moral exceptions regarding the slaughter of civilians.”
Electronic Intifada director Ali Abunimah said, “Basically Netanyahu is saying that Australia got what it had coming for not supporting his genocide in Gaza even more than it already does.”
Avi Meyerstein, founder of the Washington, DC-based Alliance for Middle East Peace, declared: “This is absurd. Calling to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict with peace, security, and self-determination for all, recognizing Israel and Palestine both, is a call to reduce the flames and put everyone on a path toward a better future.”
Cameron Kasky, who survived the 2018 mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida and is now running for Congress as a Democrat in New York, also blasted Netanyahu over his comments, saying that “this is an atrocious downplaying of real antisemitism at a time when rampant Jew hatred is killing people.”
The death toll in Australia has risen to 16, including one of at least two gunmen, and dozens more people were injured in the attack. A bystander who wrestled a gun away from one of the shooters has been identified by Australian media as Ahmed al Ahmed, a 43-year-old fruit shop owner and father. His cousin said that he was shot twice and had to get surgery.
Even Netanyahu recognized that in Australia, “we saw an action of a brave man—turns out a Muslim brave man, and I salute him—that stopped one of these terrorists from killing innocent Jews,” but the Israeli leader then doubled down on what he called Albanese’s “weakness.”
Responding to Netanyahu, Assal Rad, a fellow at the Arab Center Washington, DC, said that “blaming Palestinian statehood, while committing genocide against them, is just another reminder that you want to erase Palestinians from existence.”
“If you condemn the horrific, antisemitic attack in Bondi Beach while still defending genocide in Gaza, you’re not actually outraged by the killing of innocent people,” Rad also said. “It’s not hard to condemn both, unless you think some lives are more valuable than others.”
“This is an atrocious downplaying of real antisemitism at a time when rampant Jew hatred is killing people,” said an American congressional candidate and school shooting survivor.
Health workers move a man on a stretcher to an ambulance after a shooting at Bondi Beach in Sydney, Australia on December 14, 2025.
(Photo by Saeed Khan/AFP via Getty Images)
Jessica Corbett
Dec 14, 2025
COMMON DREAMS
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was swiftly criticized around the world on Sunday for trying to connect a deadly shooting that targeted a Hanukkah celebration at Bondi Beach in Sydney to the Australian government’s decision to recognize Palestinian statehood.
Netanyahu referenced a letter he sent to Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese in August, after Albanese and Foreign Affairs Minister Penny Wong announced the decision, which followed similar moves from Canada, France, and the United Kingdom, amid Israel’s assault on the Gaza Strip, which has been widely condemned as genocide.
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As Netanyahu noted, he wrote to Albanese: “Your call for a Palestinian state pours fuel on the antisemitic fire. It rewards Hamas terrorists. It emboldens those who menace Australian Jews and encourages the Jew hatred now stalking your streets.”
The Israeli leader shared a video and transcript of his commentary on the social media platform X, where Jasper Nathaniel, who reports on the illegally occupied West Bank, called it a “depraved response to a depraved act.”
“Obviously massacring unarmed men, women, and children at a Hanukkah celebration is antisemitic terror,” Nathaniel added in a separate thread. “Just like massacring unarmed men, women, and children in Gaza and the West Bank is anti-Palestinian terror. There are no moral exceptions regarding the slaughter of civilians.”
Electronic Intifada director Ali Abunimah said, “Basically Netanyahu is saying that Australia got what it had coming for not supporting his genocide in Gaza even more than it already does.”
Avi Meyerstein, founder of the Washington, DC-based Alliance for Middle East Peace, declared: “This is absurd. Calling to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict with peace, security, and self-determination for all, recognizing Israel and Palestine both, is a call to reduce the flames and put everyone on a path toward a better future.”
Cameron Kasky, who survived the 2018 mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida and is now running for Congress as a Democrat in New York, also blasted Netanyahu over his comments, saying that “this is an atrocious downplaying of real antisemitism at a time when rampant Jew hatred is killing people.”
The death toll in Australia has risen to 16, including one of at least two gunmen, and dozens more people were injured in the attack. A bystander who wrestled a gun away from one of the shooters has been identified by Australian media as Ahmed al Ahmed, a 43-year-old fruit shop owner and father. His cousin said that he was shot twice and had to get surgery.
Even Netanyahu recognized that in Australia, “we saw an action of a brave man—turns out a Muslim brave man, and I salute him—that stopped one of these terrorists from killing innocent Jews,” but the Israeli leader then doubled down on what he called Albanese’s “weakness.”
Responding to Netanyahu, Assal Rad, a fellow at the Arab Center Washington, DC, said that “blaming Palestinian statehood, while committing genocide against them, is just another reminder that you want to erase Palestinians from existence.”
“If you condemn the horrific, antisemitic attack in Bondi Beach while still defending genocide in Gaza, you’re not actually outraged by the killing of innocent people,” Rad also said. “It’s not hard to condemn both, unless you think some lives are more valuable than others.”
'Start rounding them up!' Conservative commentator blames mass shooting on peace activists
Alexander Willis
December 14, 2025
Alexander Willis
December 14, 2025
RAW STORY
Middle East Forum Chief Strategist Jim Hanson appears on Fox News'
Middle East Forum Chief Strategist Jim Hanson appears on Fox News'
"Fox & Friends," Dec. 14, 2025. (Screengrab / Fox News)
Conservative commentator and U.S. Army veteran Jim Hanson took to Fox News Sunday to lay blame for the deadly mass shooting in Australia targeting its Jewish community on critics of Israel’s military siege on Gaza.
On Sunday, at least 11 people were killed and at least 29 injured after two gunmen opened fire at an event on Bondi Beach celebrating the start of the Jewish holiday Hanukkah, according to BBC.
Hanson, the chief strategist at the U.S.-based conservative think tank Middle East Forum, blamed the attack, in part, on “groups” that he accused of spreading “lies” about Israel’s siege on Gaza, which has killed at least 70,000 people, the majority of them women and children, though other analyses suggest the death toll to be much higher.
“The idea you can secure any large group of people in a country like Australia, the United States or others is just not possible; we have to get them left of the attack before they do it, infiltrate their networks, find their funders and start rounding them up and putting them away!” Hanson said, appearing on Fox News’ “Fox & Friends.”
“We can't stop an event like this, but we can stop the groups we're now allowing to go ahead and use the Gaza genocide and the Gaza famine – and other lies like that – to generate outrage and cause these types of horrific events.”
Despite Hanson’s assertion that accusations of genocide were false, a United Nations commission found in September that Israel’s actions in Gaza did constitute genocide, as have a litany of other international organizations such as Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and the International Association of Genocide Scholars.
Hanson’s dismissal of claims of famine in Gaza have also been similarly rebuked by leading human rights organizations and bodies.
Nevertheless, Hanson continued to lay blame for the attack on such groups, declaring there to be an immediate threat of what he called the “red-green axis,” which he described as a coalition of “Islamist movements” and “the leftist revolutionary movement.”
“To undermine western culture… events like this are designed to do that,” Hanson said. “They're designed to strike fear, they're designed to ruin our ability to enjoy the wonderful culture we've built in the hopes of rising up and bringing what they have, which is an Islamist culture that's destructive, and a leftist-communist-style culture which is equally destructive.”
Conservative commentator and U.S. Army veteran Jim Hanson took to Fox News Sunday to lay blame for the deadly mass shooting in Australia targeting its Jewish community on critics of Israel’s military siege on Gaza.
On Sunday, at least 11 people were killed and at least 29 injured after two gunmen opened fire at an event on Bondi Beach celebrating the start of the Jewish holiday Hanukkah, according to BBC.
Hanson, the chief strategist at the U.S.-based conservative think tank Middle East Forum, blamed the attack, in part, on “groups” that he accused of spreading “lies” about Israel’s siege on Gaza, which has killed at least 70,000 people, the majority of them women and children, though other analyses suggest the death toll to be much higher.
“The idea you can secure any large group of people in a country like Australia, the United States or others is just not possible; we have to get them left of the attack before they do it, infiltrate their networks, find their funders and start rounding them up and putting them away!” Hanson said, appearing on Fox News’ “Fox & Friends.”
“We can't stop an event like this, but we can stop the groups we're now allowing to go ahead and use the Gaza genocide and the Gaza famine – and other lies like that – to generate outrage and cause these types of horrific events.”
Despite Hanson’s assertion that accusations of genocide were false, a United Nations commission found in September that Israel’s actions in Gaza did constitute genocide, as have a litany of other international organizations such as Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and the International Association of Genocide Scholars.
Hanson’s dismissal of claims of famine in Gaza have also been similarly rebuked by leading human rights organizations and bodies.
Nevertheless, Hanson continued to lay blame for the attack on such groups, declaring there to be an immediate threat of what he called the “red-green axis,” which he described as a coalition of “Islamist movements” and “the leftist revolutionary movement.”
“To undermine western culture… events like this are designed to do that,” Hanson said. “They're designed to strike fear, they're designed to ruin our ability to enjoy the wonderful culture we've built in the hopes of rising up and bringing what they have, which is an Islamist culture that's destructive, and a leftist-communist-style culture which is equally destructive.”
Gunmen kill at least 11 during Jewish celebration at Sydney’s Bondi Beach
Two gunmen opened fire at a Jewish holiday event at Sydney’s Bondi Beach on Sunday evening, killing at least 11 people and injuring nearly 30 others in what Australian authorities have declared a terrorist attack.
Issued on: 14/12/2025
Two gunmen opened fire at a Jewish holiday event at Sydney’s Bondi Beach on Sunday evening, killing at least 11 people and injuring nearly 30 others in what Australian authorities have declared a terrorist attack.
Issued on: 14/12/2025
Police walk on a street after a shooting incident at Bondi Beach in Sydney on December 14, 2025. Australian police said two people were in custody following reports of multiple gunshots on December 14 at Sydney's famed Bondi Beach, urging the public to take shelter. AFP - DAVID GRAY
Police said one attacker was shot dead at the scene and the second was arrested in critical condition. Among the injured were two police officers.
Hundreds had gathered for Chanukah by the Sea, marking the first night of the Jewish festival of Hanukkah, when the attackers struck shortly after 6:45 pm local time.
New South Wales Police Commissioner Mal Lanyon said the shooting was “targeted at Sydney’s Jewish community” and confirmed that an improvised explosive device had been found in one of the suspects’ vehicles. “The death toll remains fluid,” he said, as emergency crews continued to treat victims at nearby hospitals.
One of those killed was identified as Rabbi Eli Schlanger, assistant rabbi at Chabad of Bondi and a key organiser of the Hanukkah event. Chabad, an Orthodox Jewish outreach movement, said he had worked in the coastal suburb for more than 18 years.
Videos broadcast on Australian television appeared to show a bystander tackling and disarming one of the gunmen before police intervened.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese described the massacre as “an act of evil antisemitism and terrorism that has struck the heart of our nation.” Speaking in Canberra, he said the country “must stand united against hate and violence” and pledged that authorities would “eradicate” such extremism.
The attack comes amid a sharp rise in antisemitic incidents in Australia following the 2023 Hamas assault on Israel. Reported cases of harassment, vandalism and physical attacks against Jewish people have more than tripled in the past year, according to government figures.
Australia’s Jewish population, estimated at about 117,000, is concentrated largely in Sydney and Melbourne. In recent months, synagogues, Jewish schools and businesses in both cities have faced security threats and acts of vandalism.
Israel’s President Isaac Herzog said the country’s “heart misses a beat” in solidarity with the victims, urging Australia to “fight against the enormous wave of antisemitism” affecting its Jewish communities.
Gun violence remains rare in Australia following sweeping firearm controls introduced after the 1996 Port Arthur massacre, which killed 35 people. Sunday’s mass shooting is the country’s deadliest in nearly three decades.
(With newswires)
Police said one attacker was shot dead at the scene and the second was arrested in critical condition. Among the injured were two police officers.
Hundreds had gathered for Chanukah by the Sea, marking the first night of the Jewish festival of Hanukkah, when the attackers struck shortly after 6:45 pm local time.
New South Wales Police Commissioner Mal Lanyon said the shooting was “targeted at Sydney’s Jewish community” and confirmed that an improvised explosive device had been found in one of the suspects’ vehicles. “The death toll remains fluid,” he said, as emergency crews continued to treat victims at nearby hospitals.
One of those killed was identified as Rabbi Eli Schlanger, assistant rabbi at Chabad of Bondi and a key organiser of the Hanukkah event. Chabad, an Orthodox Jewish outreach movement, said he had worked in the coastal suburb for more than 18 years.
Videos broadcast on Australian television appeared to show a bystander tackling and disarming one of the gunmen before police intervened.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese described the massacre as “an act of evil antisemitism and terrorism that has struck the heart of our nation.” Speaking in Canberra, he said the country “must stand united against hate and violence” and pledged that authorities would “eradicate” such extremism.
The attack comes amid a sharp rise in antisemitic incidents in Australia following the 2023 Hamas assault on Israel. Reported cases of harassment, vandalism and physical attacks against Jewish people have more than tripled in the past year, according to government figures.
Australia’s Jewish population, estimated at about 117,000, is concentrated largely in Sydney and Melbourne. In recent months, synagogues, Jewish schools and businesses in both cities have faced security threats and acts of vandalism.
Israel’s President Isaac Herzog said the country’s “heart misses a beat” in solidarity with the victims, urging Australia to “fight against the enormous wave of antisemitism” affecting its Jewish communities.
Gun violence remains rare in Australia following sweeping firearm controls introduced after the 1996 Port Arthur massacre, which killed 35 people. Sunday’s mass shooting is the country’s deadliest in nearly three decades.
(With newswires)
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