Bondi Beach heroes show why everyday people run toward danger

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. SYDNEY—In the immediate aftermath of the deadly attack on a Jewish community at Sydney’s Bondi Beach, images of a man tackling one of the shooters—potentially preventing even more deaths—transfixed the world. But footage from the scene showed there were other instances of heroism that day: A retired mechanic rushed one of the attackers and grabbed his weapon.

Later, another man ran up and threw an object at the same attacker. Lifeguards at the world-famous beach also headed to the area while the assault was under way. The attack on a Hanukkah celebration by two shooters, which killed 15 and wounded several dozen, shocked the world.

But the extraordinary acts of a number of people on the scene heartened many in Australia and beyond. Their actions raised a question: How can ordinary people respond with such bravery? Images of Ahmed Al Ahmed—a Syrian man who immigrated to Australia two decades ago and owns a tobacco shop in Sydney—tackling one of the attackers sped around the world quickly after Sunday’s assault. “He didn’t think about anything else but to go and stop that person," said Tamer Kahil, a former president of the Australians for Syria Association, who visited Ahmed in the hospital where he was recovering from gunshot wounds sustained during the attack.

In speeches following the attack, Australia’s worst mass shooting in nearly 30 years, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese lauded the intervention of Ahmed and members of the Jewish community, including Boris Gurman, the retired mechanic, and Reuven Morrison, the man who threw an object—Albanese said he threw bricks—at the attackers. Gurman and Morrison were killed in the attack. “These are Australian heroes," Albanese said.