Misinformation about the attacker\u2019s identity \u2013 as a Muslim or Jewish man \u2013 spread widely online before police identified the suspect
\nSydney
\nAustralians are mourning the death of five women and a \u201ccourageous\u201d Pakistani security guard killed in a stabbing attack at a Sydney shopping centre.
\nPolice on Sunday said they were yet to confirm any motivation or ideology behind the attacks in Sydney\u2019s Bondi Junction but are investigating if the killer deliberately targeted women.
\nMisinformation speculating about the attacker\u2019s identity, as a Muslim or Jewish man, spread widely online before police identified the suspected killer \u2013 Joel Cauchi, a white Christian man and an Australian national, who was the seventh person killed in the attack.
\nThe 40-year-old suspect from Queensland was killed at the scene by a police officer who shot him after he allegedly confronted her with a knife, police said.
\nThe five women he allegedly killed included Ashlee Good, whose nine-month-old baby, suffering stab wounds, was taken to hospital.
\nGood\u2019s family described her as an \u201call around outstanding human\u201d and said in a statement on Sunday they were still \u201creeling from the terrible loss\u201d.
\nHer family also thanked two men who \u201cheld and cared for our baby when Ashlee could not\u201d and said the nine-month-old was \u201ccurrently doing well\u201d after undergoing hours of surgery.
\nFaraz Tahir, 30, a security guard who had recently moved to Australia after fleeing persecution in Pakistan, was also killed in the attack, \u201cwhile defending others\u201d, the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community of Australia said in a statement.
\nThe statement said Tahir was a \u201ccherished member\u201d of the Ahmadiyya Muslim community \u201cknown for his dedication and kindness\u201d who came to Australia seeking refuge about a year ago.
\nElven other people were also taken to hospital suffering stab wounds, including nine women and two men, local police said.
\nNew South Wales (NSW) Police Commissioner Karen Webb told reporters on Sunday the higher number of women targeted in the attack was part of their investigation.
\n\u2018False claims and rumours\u2019
\nSpeculations that the \u201cperpetrator was Muslim or Palestinian emerged within minutes\u201d, leading to \u201canti-Muslim hatred\u201d in the comment threads of leading Australian media outlets, the Australian Muslim Advocacy Network (AMAN) said on Sunday.
\nAn article on another News Corp site remained online with the headline \u201cWas this a terrorist attack? Question all of Australia is asking\u201d on Sunday night.
\nA \u201cstory about the perpetrator being a different person with a Jewish name emerged, also false\u201d, AMAN said, adding that \u201cour hearts go out to the victims\u2019 families and the baby who has lost her mother\u201d.
\nSarah Schwartz from the Jewish Council of Australia said \u201cright-wing Islamophobic groups\u201d had \u201c[exploited] this tragedy to push their hateful agenda\u201d.
\n\u201cWe must not allow this tragedy to be exploited for political gain or to stoke Islamophobia or anti-Semitism,\u201d she said.
\nCameron Wilson, a reporter at Australian news outlet Crikey, said social media platform X \u201cseemed to be the engine room of many Bondi Junction false claims and rumours\u201d.
\n\u201cIt\u2019s horrifying that while people were pre-emptively and baselessly blaming immigration for the Bondi Junction attack, one of the victims was a refugee security guard who died serving others,\u201d Wilson said in a post on social media.
\nIt was the deadliest attack in Australia since six people were killed in December 2022, which police months later attributed to \u201cChristian extremist ideology\u201d, with Webb telling reporters that police had ruled out links to Christian activism in Saturday\u2019s attack.
\nWhile fewer mass shootings have occurred since Australia brought in strict gun laws following the 1996 Port Arthur mass shooting, an Australian attacker killed 51 people at two mosques in Christchurch about five years ago in one of the deadliest mass shootings in modern history.
\nThe number of women killed by men in Australia has been the subject of widespread protests in recent months and years, with activist group Counting Dead Women saying the five women murdered on Saturday brought the total number of Australian women killed so far in 2024 to 23.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Misinformation about the attacker\u2019s identity \u2013 as a Muslim or Jewish man \u2013 spread widely online before police identified the suspect Sydney Australians are mourning the death of five women and a \u201ccourageous\u201d Pakistani security guard killed in a stabbing attack at a Sydney shopping centre. Police on Sunday said they were yet to confirm […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":400119,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-400099","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-top-news"},"yoast_head":"\n