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Australian authorities pledged on Monday to review the country’s firearms laws and do more to combat antisemitism after gunmen killed 15 people in an attack on a Jewish festival in Sydney.
Officials said on Monday that a father and son were behind Sunday’s assault at Bondi Beach. One of the gunmen was killed by police while the other is in custody.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese visited the site of the attack and said authorities would do “whatever is necessary” to protect the country’s Jewish community.
“Antisemitism is a scourge,” he said at a press conference.
Albanese is due to hold a national cabinet meeting including leaders of Australia’s states later on Monday.
The attack on Sunday evening targeted a Jewish celebration of the first night of Hanukkah, the festival of light, at one of the world’s most famous beaches.
Widely viewed images showed two gunmen, who authorities said were aged 50 and 24, firing “long arm” weapons as people fled the beach.
Some of the victims were identified on Monday, including a British-born rabbi, a 10-year-old girl and a Holocaust survivor. A further 27 people remain in hospital and authorities said some were in critical condition.
Authorities said they were treating the attack as terrorism.
It is the deadliest attack on Australian soil since 1996 when 35 people were killed by a lone gunman in Port Arthur, Tasmania. Australia adopted some of the most stringent gun laws in the world after that incident.
Asked whether Australia needed a further gun crackdown, Albanese said: “We will look at whatever is necessary, whatever comes out of this investigation. If there is any action required in terms of legislative response, we will certainly have it.”
Chris Minns, premier of New South Wales, of which Sydney is the state capital, said his administration was looking at a review of gun laws following the attack. “Obviously, we’re in the early stages of this investigation . . we will take every step we possibly can to keep our community safe,” he said.
Minns said at a further press conference that gun laws “need to change” but that it would take time for legislation to pass. He said it was “horrifying” that powerful weapons intended for farms would be used in a terrorist attack in the heart of Sydney.
The older gunman, who was killed during the attack, legally possessed six guns, according to police and held a licence to use firearms for a decade.
Maya Argüello, a law lecturer at Swinburne University of Technology’s law school, said that the attack would raise questions about whether the gun laws need to be tightened, especially as one of the attackers was known to the security services.
She said Australia did not yet have a national firearms registry. “There’s a lot of flags here. These conversations are going to be front and centre of the investigation.”
Alex Ryvchin, co-chief executive of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry, said that there clearly had been “catastrophic failings” in the country’s political and security reaction to the growing tide of antisemitic incidents and attacks, including two synagogue fire bombings.
“The consequence is body bags in the sand,” he said.