MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — Israel President Isaac Herzog started a state visit Monday aimed at consoling grieving Australian Jews and improving bilateral relations by laying a wreath and stones at the site of an antisemitic attack in Sydney that left 15 dead.
Herzog met victims’ families and survivors of the Dec. 14 attack on a Jewish festival at Bondi Beach. Only one of the two alleged gunmen survived following a gunbattle with police. Naveed Akram has been charged with committing a terrorist act, murdering 15 people and wounding another 40 in what was Australia’s worst mass shooting in 29 years.
Herzog laid the wreath and two stones he had brought from Jerusalem at the rain-swept Bondi Pavillion near the site of the massacre. The pavilion became on impromptu memorial in the days after the tragedy as flowers and cards were placed there.
Herzog says he’s in Sydney to show solidarity and love
The Israeli president said the stones would remain at Bondi in memory of the victims and as a reminder that good people of all faiths and nations “will continue to hold strong in the face of terror, violence and hatred, and that we shall overcome this evil together.”
“We were shaken to our core when we first heard about the Bondi Beach attack. Our heart missed a beat, like all Israelis and all Jews. And I’m here to express solidarity, friendship, and love,” Herzog told reporters.
“And I also believe that this is an opportunity to upgrade the relations between Israel and Australia because we are two democracies that share values together and we are confronting the roots of evil from all over the world. And we should do so together,” he added.
The visit to Bondi within hours of th …