140. No nation is immune to the threat of Islamic terrorism

Christmas and New Year's Eve are important occasions worldwide. People travel extensively to visit friends, relatives, and exotic destinations. They need to feel safe while travelling. 

So, receiving terrible news during this festive season mars our spirit.

Three days back on Sunday, Australia experienced its deadliest mass shooting when two gunmen opened fire on a large group who had gathered to celebrate the Jewish festival of Hanukkah at Bondi in Sydney, killing 16 people. 

Amongst the dead were a Holocaust survivor, a London-born rabbi and a French national. Forty-one people – including four children – were injured.

Bondi is a popular seaside destination in Australia. It is recognised as the hub of Sydney's Jewish community, which is one of the two largest in the country, second only to Melbourne.

As anticipated, the gunmen were identified as 50-year-old Sajid Akram, who was shot by police and died at the scene, and his 24-year-old son Naveed Akram, who suffered critical injuries.

Inspired by ISIS, it was all to advance a religious cause and cause fear in the community.

The incident acts as a cautionary signal to individuals opposing the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) in India. 

Sajid Akram, 50, arrived in Australia from Hyderabad on a student visa in 1998 on an Indian passport. He had received a degree in commerce and returned to India just six times in the past 27 years. His son, Naveed Akram, is an Australian-born citizen.

In their car were four of Sajid’s six registered guns, two homemade Islamic State flags and improvised explosive devices.

Naveed Akram was working with young men performing street dawah, a form of outreach in which the ultimate goal is to convert passersby to Islam.

Both Naveed and Sajid Akram traveled to the Philippines in November before the act. The reasons remain unknown so far.

However, it is undeniable that everything was rooted in religion, particularly Islam.

Since the start of the Gaza war in October 2023, like many other countries, Australia has also seen an uptick in attacks targeting Jewish communities and individuals. 

In many Western universities, anti-Semitism has also increased in education and the arts. 

In fact, anti-Semitism has become deeply ingrained and normalised within academia and the cultural sphere, highlighting the urgent need to confront these problems. 

A regular diet of anti-Semitism on campus and in the cultural space is turning many students into outright Jew haters.

Like the US, there is no law governing guns. As a result, the number of firearms in Australia, as well as the number of people with licenses to own them, has been steadily growing. 

In New South Wales, where the Bondi Beach shooting occurred, there were 260,000 gun licences in 2025, compared to 181,000 in 2001.

France has already been declared by travellers an unsafe place; Islamic and Black unemployed young men horribly control London streets and tubes. In US cities, no one knows when an unknown guy may appear with a gun and indiscriminately fire.

Islamic terrorism is gradually spreading across beautiful parts of the world. Israel has significantly contributed to fuelling this conflict.

Given this perspective, how can we criticize the actions of many countries towards immigrants?

There seems to be no middle ground.