‘We stand with Jewish Australians’: Albanese speaks in church as political recriminations mount

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Victim’s dad criticises Albanese

Mourners who gathered at Bondi during the afternoon also directed their fury at Albanese. The grieving father of 10-year-old Matilda, who was killed on Sunday, described her final moments before lashing out at the government.

“I saw her go down and I crawled to her and took my shirt off and wrapped it around her. She was telling me it was hard to breathe. I was holding her,” the man, named Michael, said. “He [Albanese] has betrayed the Jewish people of Australia.”

The prime minister had on Wednesday morning conceded in a snap press conference outside St Vincent’s hospital that his government needed to take stronger action on antisemitism – a message his most senior ministers repeated throughout the day.

“We need to learn any lessons that are learned from this, undertake stronger action, undertake any legislative change, undertake any powers, additional powers that are needed across the board, to work with the Jewish community,” Albanese said.

“We want to stamp out and eradicate antisemitism from our society. We want to also stamp out the evil ideology of what would appear to be, from the investigators, an ISIS-inspired attack. That has no place, that sort of hatred.”

But Liberal leader Sussan Ley also turned up the heat on the government, ending prospects of bipartisanship after the shooting and instead ramping up the Coalition’s criticism.

Ley went to the funeral of Rabbi Eli Schlanger, which Albanese did not attend. As the prime minister addressed the service at St Mary’s Cathedral in the Sydney CBD, Ley remained at Bondi throughout the evening, where she addressed the crowd and gave a speech.

“My message to you is this – if I become prime minister, and you practise hate speech, and you talk about radical Islam in a way that harms and hurts your fellow man and woman, and if you glorify hatred, and you are not an Australian citizen, you will be deported,” she said.

“And if you are an Australian citizen, you will be arrested.”

Federal Opposition Leader Sussan Ley addresses mourners at Bondi Beach.

Speaking at Bondi earlier the day, she said Jewish Australians had looked to Albanese “and he has failed them, he has failed them every single day”.

“Has [Albanese] reassured the Jewish community? Is he here at Bondi? Has he walked the streets as we have? Has he listened?”

Wednesday’s funeral was attended by NSW Premier Chris Minns, former prime minister Scott Morrison and other Coalition frontbenchers. Earlier in the day, Albanese had said he would attend events when he received an invitation.

Labor minister Chris Bowen said the prime minister was singularly focused on responding to the massacre. Albanese visited shooting victims in hospital on Wednesday morning. He last visited Bondi when he laid flowers on Monday morning.

“There’s been public events. There’s been private events. The prime minister has been talking to victims, to the families of victims. He’s been to the site,” Bowen said on Sky News on Wednesday afternoon. “That sort of partisan point scoring by members of the opposition is pretty unfortunate.”

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese attended the Bondi Pavilion memorial on Monday, but was criticised by the Coalition for not coming back on Wednesday.

The chief minister of the Great Synagogue, Rabbi Benjamin Elton, spoke at the same memorial as Albanese on Wednesday night, and called on the government to provide an “explicit, direct response” to a report from Australia’s special envoy to combat antisemitism, Jillian Segal.

“The first duty of a state is to defend its citizens, all its citizens, including its Jewish citizens,” Elton said. “I have no doubt that our political leaders believe that as much as I do, but now we must see concrete actions being taken.”

Albanese defends his party’s track record

Albanese’s pledge to do more on antisemitism came the day after former prime minister John Howard castigated Albanese and Foreign Minister Penny Wong on Tuesday for lacking leadership in their response to antisemitism since the October 7, 2023 attacks.

Earlier on Wednesday morning, Albanese was more defensive about his government’s track record. While speaking on ABC News Radio, Albanese shared a list of measures his government had enacted to protect Jewish Australians, including banning the Nazi salute and appointing antisemitism envoy Jillian Segal, but added “you can always do more”.

Wong and Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles had strengthened their message on morning media appearances. Wong told ABC Radio National: “We have taken many actions, including criminalising hate speech, but what I would say to you is that we all understand we need to do more. We dedicate every resource required to making sure Jewish Australians are safe and protected.”

Meanwhile, Marles told Seven’s Sunrise: “We need to do more, and we will do more. And that’s really clear. But as I said, this is not something which is solved overnight.”

But Frydenberg said the government had been warned it needed to take stronger action on antisemitism as he blamed the prime minister for the largest massacre of Jews outside Israel since October 7, 2023.

“The prime minister has allowed Australia to be radicalised on his watch ... It’s time for him to accept personal responsibility for the death of 15 innocent people, including a 10-year-old child,” he said.

In an eight-point list, Frydenberg said the government needed to ban Muslim “hate preachers” and extremist organisations such as Hizb ut-Tahrir. He said people who incited violence or flew flags linked to proscribed terrorist organisations should be prosecuted, and pro-Palestine protests stopped.

Frydenberg sheds tears as he leaves flowers at the Bondi memorial on Wednesday.

He called for the government to invest further in Holocaust education, which he said was piecemeal in Australia, and reform the education system to improve its teaching of Australian values. He also said the immigration system should be strengthened “to remind people it is a privilege to come to this country”.

Finally, he said the government must implement the antisemitism report, which was delivered in July, and launch an inquiry into the massacre and rise of antisemitism in Australia.

Asked later on the ABC’s 7.30 whether his comments were political in nature, given Frydenberg could return to office, the former treasurer said he was “deeply offended”.

“The reality is this: I’m an Australian who has to have personal security because my life is endangered in this country, and I was the treasurer of this country. My children go to a school where there are armed guards outside,” he said.

“How should we live with this? Why should we live with this? So if I’m not going to speak out, who is? If not now, when?”

Treasurer Jim Chalmers said he had a lot of respect for Frydenberg. “I don’t doubt the intensity or the sincerity of his views, and we take them seriously. And he, like a lot of Australians, is mourning and is grieving, and we will take suggestions from him,” he said.

Former Liberal prime minister Tony Abbott added to a chorus of criticism on Wednesday, with his own statement accusing the government of “hand-wringing impotence”.

“No hate preachers have been prosecuted or deported and no hate marches have been banned, even though these have gone way beyond any possible exercise of freedom of speech or protest into acts of harassment and intimidation,” he said.

With Angus Dalton