"Bondi Beach is Australia's playground, our piazza, and the mother church of our national religion: the worship of sun, sand, and salt water. Bondi is where millions of us learn to swim, to surf, to parade up and down the sands; where we rinse off our stress in the Pacific Ocean and suck in great gulps of sea air; where we bring interstate and overseas visitors to skite about our good fortune; where we thrill in our inheritance."
"This is why Australians are angry and heartsick at Sunday's despicable act of terror, in which two shooters-carrying long arms and dressed in black-launched an assault on a Hanukkah celebration on Bondi's wide sands. Fifteen people were murdered, including two rabbis, a 10-year-old girl, and a Holocaust survivor. May their memory be a blessing. Dozens were wounded; hundreds will never recover completely. Australia is changed forever."
Bondi Beach serves as a central site of Australian coastal life where people learn to swim, surf, parade on sands, and enjoy the ocean and sea air. Australians regard beaches as democratic spaces and expect public safety, exemplified by the surf‑lifesaving movement and Bondi's century‑old lifesaving club. Bondi has been a longstanding centre of Australian Jewish life, hosting synagogues, mikvahs, kosher butchers, delicatessens, and community clubs. A Hanukkah celebration on Bondi's sands was attacked by two shooters, killing fifteen, wounding dozens, and leaving hundreds scarred; the atrocity demands the strongest possible response and justice.
Read at The Atlantic
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