‘Summer of Terror’ Led to Bondi Beach Massacre: Royal Commission

Antisemitism is a ‘virus,’ counsel assisting the commission has said, while another lawyer has detailed some of the personal testimony the commission will hear.

Counsel assisting the Royal Commission on Anti-Semitism and Social Cohesion, Zelie Heger. Screenshot of livestream of the Royal Commission proceedings

A lawyer assisting the Royal Commission into the Bondi Beach mass shooting has described the year ending 2024 as the “summer of terror,” which stemmed from the Oct. 7, 2023 attacks and eventuated in Australia’s worst terror incident.

Zelie Heger said anti-Semitism is “recognised as one of society’s oldest hatreds,” but that expressions of it in Australia had increased markedly after terror group Hamas attacked an Israeli music festival on Oct. 7, killing 1,200 and capturing 250 hostages.

This, she said, “marked a significant turning point for anti-Semitism in Australia.”

Two days later, as the sails of the Sydney Opera House were lit up in the colours of the Israeli flag, a pro-Palestine protest took place on the steps of the landmark with some yelling, “Where are the Jews?”

“We'll hear evidence about that event and the fear and anxiety it created in the community,” Heger said.

“Later that year came what has been described as the ’summer of terror,' which included the arson attack on the Adass Synagogue in Melbourne, another arson attack on a kosher catering business in Bondi, a car being torched, and cars and buildings targeted with anti-Israel graffiti in Woollahra, a suburb with a high concentration of Jewish residents, Allawah and Newtown synagogues being defaced with anti-Semitic and anti-Israel graffiti,” Heger said.

She also listed an arson attack on the former home of Alex Rivchin, co-CEO of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry, and the discovery of a caravan containing explosives in Dural, New South Wales, along with a note containing the addresses of Jewish people, a synagogue, and the words, “[Expletive] the Jews.”

Though that was later found to be fabricated by organised criminals for their own benefit, the fact that the event was “designed to create fear in the Jewish community is deeply alarming,” Heger said.

“In November 2025, the neo-Nazi National Socialist Network rally outside New South Wales Parliament, carrying the banner ‘Abolish the Jewish Lobby,’ occurred. And of course, tragically, in December 2025, the attack at Bondi.”

‘Deeply Traumatic’ for Jews

Heger went on to detail some of the incidents experienced by Jewish families or individuals, which she said ranged from “overt verbal attacks to more flippant and casual and subtle anti-Semitism, which is not directed at anyone in particular, necessarily, but is nevertheless deeply traumatic for the Jewish community to witness.”

Hegel said that the Commission would hear stories of children subjected to abuse in public spaces “simply for being recognisably Jewish.

“The perpetrators of that abuse have been both adults and children. In one terrible incident, one school student told a Jewish student on a public bus that Hitler should have gassed them all. We’ve heard stories of school students using ‘dirty Jew’ as an insult, regardless of the target’s faith or background, or [expletive] Jews being used as a curse word.”

Commissioner Notes ‘Sharp Spike’ in Anti-Semitism

Former High Court Judge Virginia Bell, the commissioner heading the Bondi Beach terror attack Royal Commission, says the “sharp spike in anti-Semitism” across the country “seems clearly linked to events in the Middle East.”

“It’s important that people understand how quickly those events can prompt ugly displays of hostility towards Jewish Australians simply because they’re Jews.”

Many witnesses, she said, had asked to share their experiences anonymously out of fear they might be subjected to more hostile attention in person or online, and the Commission would allow them to do so.

A small group would give evidence in a closed, non-public session.

Bell also noted that there were differences of opinion among Australian Jews on many issues, including on Middle East politics.

“I’m conscious that some Jews and other members of the Australian community believe that the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s (IHRA) working definition of anti-Semitism can be weaponised in order to suppress criticism of Israel. The commission has received a number of submissions to this effect,” she noted, and committed the Royal Commission to hearing a range of views.

The IHRA’s working definition has been adopted by the federal and state governments.

Right to a Homeland a ‘Core Value’

That was also mentioned by one of the counsel assisting the Commission, Richard Lancaster.

“One aspect of the inquiry ... is to identify when anti-Zionism becomes anti-Semitism,” he said. “Zionism is the belief in the [right of] Jewish people to self-determination in their ancestral and biblical homeland of Israel, a right that was achieved by the creation of the State of Israel in 1948. For many Australian Jews, this is a core value.

“Some of the examples in the IHRA definition suggest that, depending on the overall context in which words are spoken or other conduct occurs, it could be anti-Semitic to deny that right to self-determination or to express hatred toward individual Jews, or Jewish people as a community, on the basis of perceived loyalty to Israel above all else, or to attribute to Jews generally a collective responsibility for the actions of the State of Israel.

“Anti-Semitism is not a belief. It is a virus, and like a virus, it mutates,” he added.

The Commission is holding hearings in three “blocks,” each with different objectives. May 4 is the first day of Block 1, which aims to define anti-Semitism, hear the lived experience of those subjected to it, and look at metrics for measuring its prevalence. That phase will conclude on May 15.

Submissions are still open, and will remain so until Jun. 16.