Thousands of Australians’ abandoned belongings were strewn across Bondi beach as the sun rose on Monday, left behind just 10 hours earlier in the rush to escape the slaughter.
Within hours, locals had gathered the bags, towels and surfboards and laid them at the top of the beach for survivors, friends and family to collect as they returned.
Sydney’s community came together on Monday, not just to mourn those lost in the worst terrorist attack on Australian soil, but to help each other.
At dawn, mourners stared in silence at the ocean and the cars left abandoned on the streets still closed by police, searching for somewhere to direct their grief.
Some left flowers by the surf club neighbouring the park where a Hanukah celebration was taking place and where 15 people were shot dead, allegedly by a father and son working together. Others laid flowers and lit candles at the edges of Bondi’s pavilion, which was still cordoned off by police tape.
After the prime minister, Anthony Albanese, laid pink flowers and stood in silence behind the pavilion at 9am, hundreds of mourners focused their grief on the site at the back gate of the famous building.
Albanese’s handful of flowers was soon joined by a sea of bouquets, some handed out free by local stores, and a growing crowd, silently sitting or standing on the hill.
Yossi Friedman, a local rabbi, came to pray by the beach at sunrise where just hours before the alleged gunmen had fired at Friedman’s sister-in-law and her children and killed his friend Eli Schlanger.
“I want to be here this morning and put on my tallit and tefillin and offer some prayer, just to be here, but not quite knowing what to do with all these emotions,” he said.
“We will bounce back. I don’t know how … but like we’ve always done we will gather together and come back strong.”
Dozens of Jewish Australians turned to each other for support and direction as they gathered on the hill. Chaim Levitansky was among the rabbis embracing friends, praying, laying tefillin, as he mourned Eli Schlanger and those killed.
“We need to do action, we need to do good deeds,” he said.
“You knew Eli,” he told one young man before putting on phylacteries and praying. “In this situation, he would be doing exactly what I’m doing.”
With that call to action also comes anger at advocates of Palestine and at the Albanese government, which has yet to act on recommendations from its special envoy to combat antisemitism.
The crowd applauded condemnations of the government from David Ossip, president of the New South Wales Jewish board of deputies. They cheered as police moved on a woman wearing a keffiyeh from the protest.
One man verbally abused reporters for what he claimed was propaganda. A teenage boy drew a connection between the killing and Sydney’s August march in support of Palestine: “You see 100,000 people walk across the harbour bridge, what do you expect?”
At the same time, support from the community was visceral. Strangers embraced, cafes gave away coffee and chaplains and mental health volunteers handed out tissues. Tributes of flowers and candles sprang up by the lifeguards’ outpost and in front of Bondi Beach public school, which was closed for the day, as were five Sydney Jewish schools.
Christian priests and women wearing hijabs lay flowers in front of the pavilion’s gates, where Australian and Israeli flags hung side by side.
The attack targeting the Jewish community also claimed the life of at least one non-Jewish Australian and sent hundreds more running for their lives.
Paco Chumacero, who escaped the shooting, said the gunmen had directed their fire at the Chanukah festival and ignored dozens at his dance class in the park just 100 metres away.
“We were many people here, but they focused on one target,” Chumacero said.
The Peruvian Australian said the shooters only turned their attention south when Ahmed al-Ahmed tackled one to the ground. He and his friends had started approaching al-Ahmed to help before scattering back to trees as shots rang out.
Chumacero returned on Monday to find his scooter, abandoned the night before, but stayed for an hour to mourn with passersby and watch on in silence.
“Even now, I’m scared. I come here, I cry, it’s terrifying.”
Josh, who preferred not to give his surname, was among those returning to confront the scene he had fled the night before.
“I’d just seen a crowd of people running and hiding behind cars and jumping over fences, panic in people’s eyes, people running for their lives,” he said.
“[I felt] a bit apprehensive about coming out again [but] if things like these happen, you can’t sort of stay indoors with your head under the cover. You have to come out eventually, I suppose.”
In Australia, support is available at Beyond Blue on 1300 22 4636, Lifeline on 13 11 14, and Griefline on 1300 845 745. In the UK, the charity Mind is available on 0300 123 3393. Other international helplines can be found at befrienders.org
