James McGrath (Queensland, Liberal National Party, Shadow Special Minister of State) Share this | Hansard source

To the families and friends of the 15 victims of the antisemitic massacre, I am sorry. I am sorry for your loss, and I am sorry that Australia failed you. To those who ran towards gunshots, to those who shielded, to those who helped, to the first responders, to those who tackled and to those who stood up, I say thank you.

A year ago this week, I was in Poland, paying my respects at the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp because, 81 years ago, the world vowed, 'Never again,' following the Holocaust. Sadly, 'never again' has become the Bondi massacre, one of the largest massacres of Jews since the Holocaust. Since October 7, Jewish Australians have suffered under repressive antisemitism, aided by rampant Islamic extremism. The Bondi massacre didn't start at 6.42 pm on Sunday 14 December; the Bondi massacre started on the steps of the Sydney Opera House when a baying Islamic extremist mob called out for Jews: 'F the Jews,' 'Gas the Jews,' 'Where's the Jews?'

While the massacre is shocking and horrible and distressing, sadly, it is not surprising. When people, including in this chamber, were shouting and spreading the message, 'From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free,' or 'Globalise the intifada,' what did they think was going to happen? Where'd they think this was going to end? Since October 7, Jewish schools have had to have high fences and security guards. Jewish students don't wear their school uniforms on public transport. Universities have become incubators of antisemitism. Jewish businesses are being vandalised and boycotted. Jewish synagogues are being firebombed. Jewish homes are being vandalised. Jewish Australians feel safer in Israel, a country that is effectively in a permanent state of war, than they do in the so-called liberal democracy that is Australia. That is a national shame upon everybody in this chamber and every single Australian.

Yesterday I went to Bondi, as many have. Life goes on, as it should—as it must. There was a veneer of normality over that deep well of horror. So it's up to all of us to keep alive the memory of those who were murdered by stamping out the evil twins of antisemitism and Islamic extremism.