An Australian Jewish leader has become emotional recounting his experience during the Bondi terror attack.
The former President of the NSW Jewish Board of Deputies Lesli Berger gave a tearful testimony when recalling being separated from his family during the Bondi attack on December 14.
He spoke of how his two youngest children were at home and felt “completely panicked”, while his oldest son was visiting a friend’s house in the area.
“They were terrified,” he told the royal commission on Thursday.
“My middle son called his best friend because he was so terrified.”
Mr Berger then became emotional when discussing his children’s response and that he couldn’t be with them as the attack unfolded.
“I find it difficult to talk about this”, he said.
“I felt that I had failed as a parent.”
He also described the moment his son discovered a swastika had been painted on his home in Sydney almost a year earlier.
“It was a huge shock. I just honestly, even when I look at this picture now, I can’t believe this happened to my home.”
Mr Berger said his son tried to hide the graffiti from his daughter so she wouldn’t become traumatised and that a police investigation into the matter came back with no firm leads.
“Particularly once my daughter found out about it, it made them feel quite unsafe and uncomfortable in their own home,” he said.
Anti-Semitism royal commission: millions spent on aftermath of Hamas attack
The NSW Premier’s Department spent nearly $2.5m to increase the security of the Jewish community in the wake of the Hamas terror attack.
NSW Premier’s Department Secretary Simon Draper said that the sums had been spent by the Premier’s Department between October 7 2023 and June 22 2026 for the improvement of Jewish community security.
Mr Draper said the largest portion of the money was $1.5m and was granted to the Jewish Board of Deputies in the aftermath of the Bondi terror attack.
He noted how the Jewish Board of Deputies, alongside the Jewish community service groups (CSGs) and NSW Police, provided input on how funding should be allocated to vulnerable organisations like places of worship and schools.
“Over the following days, we took advice from all of those players about the types of measures that might be required because of the increased risks that was made clear by the attacks themselves and the concerns the community held.”
“We did move very quickly in making sure those funds were available.”
The funding came from the Premier’s discretionary and contingency funds which can be accessed for “highly disruptive” events with an “urgent security need”.
Mr Draper also personally approved a grant of $338,000 from the contingency fund between December 7 2024 and January 14 2025 due to an “obvious and profound heightening” of anti-Semitic attacks, the royal commission heard.
“Over that period, Hanukkah had passed, but the rate of anti-Semitic attacks had accelerated.
“There was a series of attacks on Jewish, and members of the Jewish communities homes and on places of worship, schools and other locations, so that was probably the most significant trigger.
“We were advised by the Jewish Board of Deputies that funding was going to be needed, to be continued.”
Huge amount Jewish safety costs Australia
Almost 200 Jewish groups have applied to access federal government grant money to improve security over the next three years.
Executive Council of Australian Jewry co-chief executive Peter Wertheim outlined to the anti-Semitism royal commission on Thursday how the $124m in available funding to improve safety standards would be spent.
He said more than 190 organisations had applied for grants, money that the National Council for Jewish Community Security would allocate over the next three years.
“The amounts that we’ve requested are always estimates based on what has occurred up to the point where we provide that estimate,” Mr Wertheim said.
“So in a sense, we’re always playing catch-up because the costs keep increasing and the level of need for security measures keeps increasing.”
Mr Wertheim said while initial government funding totalled $102m, an additional $22m was allocated to increase the funding under the Enhancing Security for Jewish Communities program.
An one-off $22m payment will also be provided to upgrade infrastructure to a site in Sydney.
“Although the amounts are significant and they’re generous and very much appreciated, they’re always less than what it turns out is required,” Mr Wertheim said.
“I think there could be much deeper and earlier consultation between us and the government before a grant period expires so that we can assess the current situation, the likely needs that are emerging, and a quantification of the cost of meeting those needs.
“We would like to see the government meet all of the security costs of the community.”
Jewish hate exposed
Jewish community members have been called “Zionist scum” and had swastikas painted on buildings and cars in a growing rise of anti-Semitic attacks across Australia.
Giving evidence at an anti-Semitism royal commission on Thursday, Rabbi Allison Conyer, a psychologist and the first woman rabbi in NSW, said Jewish people were told they would be hunted and described how communities in Australia had become a “den of bigotry”.
“A young adult once told me that she was walking in our neighbourhood and someone was driving by,” she said.
“They rolled down the window and said, ‘Are you Jewish? Do you know where the Jews are? We’re hunting Jews’.”
Rabbi Conyer spoke about the “normalisation or acceptance” of anti-Semitic attacks, giving specific examples of swastikas being painted on buildings and cars and Jewish community members being called “Zionist scum”.
“An old lady went to my son, who was wearing a kippah, a head covering, and said to him, ‘This is where you belong, Jew’ and pointed to her bottom,” Rabbi Conyer said.
“This is blatant anti-Semitism hiding itself and using anti-Zionism as an excuse.”
More to come