Brown U, Bondi Beach, Gaza, and Uniting in Our Humanity
Some will use this weekend's events to convince us to turn on one another—it is very important we do not listen to them
The events this weekend have left countless of us in mourning. Another mass shooting at Brown University that has killed two innocent people. A horrific mass shooting at Bondi Beach in Australia that killed 16 Jewish people as they celebrated Hanukkah. And five more Palestinian civilians killed by the Israeli government in Gaza during an alleged ceasefire. There are forces working hard to divide us is. It is very import we do not listen, and instead double down on humanity. Let’s Address This.
The Tragedy at Brown
The mass shooting at Brown University has left two people dead. Eight more injured. And already, we know how this script goes.
Before the victims’ names are fully known, before families have even had time to process their loss, the political machinery starts whirring. If the shooter is an immigrant, the call will be to expand ICE. If Muslim, expand the Muslim ban. If Black, expand prisons and policing. And if white, we are told it was a “troubled lone wolf,” a tragic but isolated story, detached from any broader system of violence. Through it all, there remains one constant: zero meaningful action on gun safety.
Thirteen years ago, after the Sandy Hook massacre, I wrote that demanding we wait to discuss gun reform was like saying we should wait for a plague to pass before talking about a cure. I wrote that the moment of grief is precisely when we must confront the root causes of mass violence—not to dishonor the victims, but to prevent future ones. It is devastating that those words apply almost verbatim today, after the Brown shooting. Even more haunting is the fact that some of the students present were survivors of previous mass shootings. That is not coincidence. That is policy failure, repeated again and again.
The Tragedy at Bondi Beach
While Americans grieve Brown, we are also mourning a horrific mass shooting in Australia, where sixteen Jewish people were killed at a Hanukkah celebration at Bondi Beach. The loss is staggering. The pain is universal. And yet, even here, bad faith actors rush in to manipulate tragedy. We are already seeing attempts to argue that this violence somehow proves gun safety laws do not work. That claim collapses under even the slightest scrutiny.
For example, Bondi was Australia’s first deadly mass shooting in three years. Brown was America’s first deadly mass shooting in three days. It was also the United States’ fifteenth deadly mass shooting of 2025—and the 389th mass shooting overall this year. There is no equivalence here. To pretend otherwise is not analysis; it is disinformation.
But beyond the statistics, beyond the policy debates that must happen, there is a deeper danger unfolding in moments like these: the deliberate effort to divide us against one another along religious and ethnic lines. Rather than centering the victims or confronting gun violence, some voices rushed to stoke fear and hatred—turning grief into a wedge.
That is why one story from Bondi matters so profoundly.
Saving One Life To Save All Humanity
At Bondi beach, as bullets targeted Jewish people in religious celebration, a 43-year-old Muslim man named Ahmed al Ahmed, a fruit shop owner and father of two, ran toward the gunfire. While others understandably fled for safety, he tackled the shooter, disarmed him, and was shot twice in the process. His actions saved lives.
Jewish and Muslim traditions both teach that to save one life is to save all of humanity. The Qur’an declares in Chapter 5 verse 33, “Whosoever killed a person, it shall be as if he had killed all mankind; and whoso gave life to one, it shall be as if he had given life to all mankind.” Likewise, the Talmud, Sanhedrin 4:5, declares, “anyone who destroys a life is considered by Scripture to have destroyed an entire world; and anyone who saves a life is as if he saved an entire world.” Ahmed lived that teaching. In the midst of terror, he chose courage. In the face of hate, he chose humanity.
The Attempts To Divide
And that humanity stands in stark contrast to those trying to exploit this tragedy for political ends. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has lashed out at Australian leadership, accusing them of antisemitism. This coming from a man facing an international arrest warrant for war crimes, a man who has repeatedly violated ceasefires and overseen the killing of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians. A man who just this week killed five more Palestinians and injured 25 more, even after agreeing to ceasefire. Experts document that Netanyahu’s military has killed nearly 400 Palestinian civilians since he agreed to ceasefire. Credibly accused war criminals do not get to lecture the world on morality. And moreover, they do not get to turn Jewish suffering into a weapon to fuel anti-Muslim hate.
Ahmed al Ahmed’s bravery tells a far more honest story than any demagogue ever could: Muslims and Jews are not enemies. Our faiths, our ethics, and our lived actions repeatedly show the opposite. The people who benefit from convincing us otherwise are not the victims of violence—they are wealthy and powerful elites who profit when working people are divided, distracted, and fighting one another.
The Need For Unity
I have said this before and will continue to say it plainly: our enemies are not each other. They are the systems and actors that refuse to address gun violence, that normalize mass death, and that stoke religious hatred to avoid accountability. We must reject those efforts with clarity and compassion.
My prayers are with the families and communities devastated by the Brown shooting, with those mourning the lives lost at Bondi, with those yet suffering genocide in Gaza, and with heroes like Ahmed al Ahmed—people who remind us that even in moments of profound darkness, humanity can still prevail.
If we are to honor the dead, we must do more than grieve. We must demand better. And we must hold fast to the simple, radical truth that our strength is in our unity, not in our infighting. And thus by saving one life at a time, we can truly save all humanity.
Mr. Ahmed al Ahmed is the one who should receive the Nobel Peace Prize. He is a truly heroic individual.
This type of tragedy is so unnecessary. If you are angry at the government, shooting a lot of people will get you attention, but it won't change anything. If you are filled with hate for another, perhaps if you got to know them on a personal level you would find they are not as you believed.
The fact that a Muslim, Ahmed al Ahmed, jumped in to save Jewish people shows humanity is not a religion, a race or an income level, it is a personal feeling that there is no need for violence to get your point across. No matter what the reason, someone like Netanyahu will use it as a political statement to sway views toward his way of thinking. Australia was right in condemning the actions of the Jewish GOVERNMENT, and recognizing that people of Palestine have as much right to live in peace as those in the Jewish community. Again - it is humanity, and there is no room for racial bias in the human race.