The Zeitgeist

The Lessons of Bondi Beach

By Howard Barbanel

Let’s be perfectly blunt -- The Bondi Beach Chanukah Massacre happened because the Feckless Woke Liberal government in Australia has allowed two-plus years of nonstop pro-Hamas pro-Gaza rallies in their major cities (much as London has), non-stop verbal violence like the “Long Live The Intifada” rallies at Sydney’s Bondi Beach (the footage is easily searchable) preceding the massacre, the 100,00-strong pro-Hamas marches across the Sydney Bridge along with attacks on a Melbourne synagogue and kosher market in Sydney this year as well.

As with most Woke governments, Conservative speech has been squelched and throttled while the most vile radical hate-filled words from Islamists and the far left are actually protected by the government instead of condemned. Warnings from the Australian Jewish community went unheeded and were in fact derided. Given all that, what do you expect will eventually happen?

Australia, much as with the rest of the Woke-led Left tolerates and enables limitless Moslem migration – people with no proclivity to acculturate or assimilate into the cultures and societies of the nations to which they migrate. It is a perverse form of reverse colonialization whereby the irrationally guilt-stricken majority white population not only welcomes the dilution and subversion of their cultures but actually pays to make it so by proffering extraordinarily generous welfare benefits to the migrants which often exceed those given to their own citizens. The Woke self-loathing of their own national origins, traditions and cultures is alarming and dangerous because this delusional self-inflicted self-flagellation could lead to the end of The West as we’ve known it and that could lead to the end of order and freedom in the world as well which depends on a strong West. The US, not immune, was careening headlong down this path between 2021 and January 2025. The Islamists, in an astonishing alliance with the far left sows chaos and violence in every Western nation – a cancerous malignancy that needs immediate surgery.                                      

The murder of 16 at Bondi Beach can be described as the first official act of the terrorist State of Palestine in Australia. Australia (along with the UK, Canada, France, Spain, and Ireland) officially recognized "Palestine" towards the end of the Gaza War. The complete unmooring of a basic moral compass during the war by Woke Western governments leads in a direct line to the intimidation, harassment, and murder of innocent Jews. Trump should be praised for rolling back all this Woke snowflake pro-Hamas bile across the US government and academia. Were I living in New York City, I'd be very afraid of what is coming under a Mayor Mamdani. Just look to London for a crystal-ball view. London also has a leftist-Moslem mayor.

This teaches us that sadly the Chanukah story is still incredibly relevant in our time -- not the menorahs and latkes so much -- but the 30-year war for independence to restore divine revealed morality as related in the Books of the Maccabees which culminated in the recapture and rededication (Chanukat HaMisbeach) of the Temple in Jerusalem. The struggle for Jewish security and freedom continues in our time as we're faced with unrelenting and unrepentant hatred all around us. Why are we so hated? Because the Jewish people stand in the way of evil’s march across the earth. At the end of the day, what we really have are each other. The lights of the Menorah show the world that we will not be silenced, cowed, or eradicated. Truth and decency will continue its forward march even in the face of Islamist and Woke headwinds. May this Chanukah rededicate us to the struggle.