Australia’s federal Police Commissioner Krissy Barrett has disclosed that the mass shooting in which 15 people were killed during a Hanukkah celebration at Sydney’s Bondi Beach was “a terrorist attack inspired by Islamic State.”
Those killed ranged in age from 10 to 87 years old. They were attending a Hanukkah event at Australia’s most famous beach Sunday when the gunshots rang out.
The suspects were a father and son, aged 50 and 24, authorities have said. The older man, whom state officials named as Sajid Akram, was shot dead. His son was being treated at a hospital.
“The suspected murderers, callous in how they allegedly coordinated their attack, appeared to have no regard for the age or ableness of their victims. It appears the alleged killers were interested only in a quest for a death tally.”
Krissy Barrett
Today’s news conference by political and law enforcement leaders was the first time officials confirmed their beliefs about the suspects’ ideologies.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said the remarks were based on evidence obtained, including “the presence of Islamic State flags in the vehicle that has been seized.”
Mal Lanyon, the Police Commissioner for New South Wales state stated that the suspects traveled to the Philippines last month, adding that their reasons for the trip and where in the Philippines they went would be probed by investigators.
He also confirmed that a vehicle removed from the scene, registered to the younger suspect, contained improvised explosive devices. “I also confirm that it contained two homemade ISIS flags,” Lanyon said.
The Philippines Bureau of Immigration confirmed today that Sajid Akram traveled to the country from Nov. 1 to Nov. 28 along with Naveed Akram, 24, giving the city of Davao as their final destination.
Groups of Muslim separatist militants, including Abu Sayyaf in the southern Philippines, once expressed support for the Islamic State group and have hosted small numbers of foreign militant combatants from Asia, the Middle East and Europe in the past.
Decades of military offensives, however, have considerably weakened Abu Sayyaf and other such armed groups, and Philippine military and police officials say there has been no recent indication of any foreign militants in the country’s south.
There are 25 people still being treated in hospitals after Sunday’s massacre, 10 of them in critical condition. Three of them are patients in a children’s hospital.
Also among them is Ahmed al Ahmed, who was captured on video tackling and disarming one assailant, before pointing the man’s weapon at him and then setting it on the ground.
Earlier, Albanese visited al Ahmed in hospital. Albanese said that the 42-year-old Syrian-born fruit shop owner had further surgery scheduled on Wednesday for shotgun wounds to his left shoulder and upper body.
Albanese told reporters after a 30-minute meeting with him and his parents, “It was a great honor to met Ahmed al Ahmed,” adding, “He is a true Australian hero.”
“We are a brave country. Ahmed al Ahmed represents the best of our country. We will not allow this country to be divided. That is what the terrorists seek. We will unite. We will embrace each other, and we’ll get through this.”
Anthony Albanese
Australians mourn at scene of shooting
Thousands have visited Bondi from all walks of life since the tragedy to pay their respects and lay flowers on a mounting pile at an impromptu memorial site.
One of the visitors on Tuesday was former Prime Minister John Howard, who was responsible the the 1996 overhaul of gun laws and an associated buy-back of newly outlawed weapons.
Israel’s Ambassador to Australia Amir Maimon visited the scene of the carnage on Tuesday and was welcomed by Jewish leaders.“I’m not sure that my vocabulary is rich enough to express how I feel. My heart is torn apart because the Jewish community, the Australians of Jewish faith, the Jewish community is also my community,” Maimon said.
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