Sydney stabbings as it happened: Fallout continues after Wakeley, Bondi Junction attacks; NSW Police may arrest church rioters today

A candlelight vigil will be held at Bondi Beach this weekend to allow the community to unite and mourn the victims of the Bondi Junction stabbing attack.

At 5.30pm on Sunday, April 21, at the Dolphin Court, south of the Bondi Pavilion, community members are encouraged to bring their own candles and take part in a minute’s silence. Mental health first aid services and counsellors will be present.

The best place to leave flowers remains the Oxford Street Mall.

The NSW government said in a statement that it would work with families at a later date to organise a formal memorial service and permanent memorial to honour the victims.

“This vigil will be an opportunity for the community to stand together to support and honour the victims and survivors of this horrific tragedy,” Premier Chris Minns said.

“I hope they can draw some strength from the fact that there’s many people that are standing with them during this time.”

An online condolence book is now live, which you can sign here.

Mayors from across Sydney have travelled to Bondi Junction to lay wreaths and join the community in mourning the six killed in Saturday’s attack.

Mayors from Parramatta, Blacktown, Liverpool, Georges River and Hornsby Shire joined Waverley Mayor Paula Masselos at the still-growing sea of flowers at the site.

“Our community in western Sydney and Liverpool, we’re devastated with this like everyone else is around Sydney,” Liverpool Mayor Ned Mannoun said.

“It’s important that we all stand together in these very challenging times.”

Masselos also said her thoughts went out to “[Mayor] Frank Carbone in Fairfield and the community in Wakeley as well” following Monday night’s stabbing of a bishop in Sydney’s west.

French President Emmanuel Macron has taken to X to share his message of support for the French tradies who became the unlikely heroes of the Bondi Junction stabbings.

Construction workers Silas Despreaux and Damien Guerot used bollards and chairs to try and stop the attacker, eventually leading hero police officer Amy Scott to perpetrator Joel Cauchi.

According to Google Translate, Macron’s post reads (roughly) as follows:

Condolences to the Australians struck by an attack in a shopping centre in Sydney on Saturday. Two of our compatriots behaved like true heroes. Very great pride and recognition.”

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has offered “bollard man” Guerot the chance to stay in Australia permanently after becoming aware he was on a work visa about to expire.

“I say this to Damien Guerot, who is dealing with his visa applications, that you are welcome here,” Albanese said.

Joining calls for calm, Australia’s two Middle Eastern Christian MPs, Peter Khalil and Michael Sukkar, say local Assyrians scarred by ISIS barbarity and historical persecution have been traumatised by Monday’s church stabbing.

Khalil, chair of the high-profile intelligence committee that was briefed on the incident on Tuesday, said Assyrian Christians were highly sensitive to church assaults because thousands of them came to Australia to escape the murderous Islamic State terror group.

“There were half a million that were displaced and their places of worship destroyed, so there were a lot of these community members who fled from Iraq and Syria during that terrible time,” Khalil, a Coptic Egyptian, said.

Khalil spoke of the “miracle” of Australia’s multicultural harmony and said most Australians did not want to see “conflicts from overseas playing out in our streets”.

Sukkar, a senior Coalition frontbencher, said Christians from the Arab world had “suffered terrible persecution for centuries”.

“Many would have been disappointed the prime minister couldn’t even mention the Assyrian Christian community as victims, until he was specifically asked by a journalist at the Sydney Morning Herald,” Sukkar, a Lebanese Maronite, said.

“The prime minister needs to show some leadership and call out the obvious Islamic extremism that was made clear by the NSW Police.”

Here’s the full story.

A 20-year-old man wrongly identified by the embattled Seven Network as the Bondi Junction mass murderer has engaged a high-profile legal team to threaten defamation action against the TV network.

Benjamin Cohen, who was incorrectly identified as the knife attacker by Seven on Sunday, has engaged two of Australia’s foremost defamation lawyers – Patrick George of Giles George as his solicitor and Sue Chrysanthou, SC, as his barrister – to seek damages from the broadcaster. The lawyers have issued a concerns notice on Wednesday morning, a compulsory first step before formal legal action is taken.

On Sunday morning, less than 24 hours after the events at Westfield Bondi Junction, in which Joel Cauchi, 40, killed six people and injured several others, Seven’s Sunrise program named Cohen, a 20-year-old student at the University of Sydney, as the perpetrator.

Cauchi was shot dead by police officer Inspector Amy Scott.

Cohen was named on social media, in particular on X (formerly Twitter), from about 8.30pm on Saturday. His name was soon trending, with more than 50,000 posts naming him as the unconfirmed killer.

Many posts drew attention to his Jewish identity.

You can read the full story here.

Staying with the Westfield Bondi Junction press conference, Scentre Group chief executive Elliott Rusanow says security will be ramped up as the public returns to the shopping centre.

“There will be an increased security presence, there will be an increase in the equipment that the security guards have to wear, but more importantly there’ll be an increased police presence,” he said.

One of the people killed when Joel Cauchi went on a stabbing rampage through the shopping centre was Westfield security guard Faraz Tahir.

Rusanow said there would now be an increase in the personal protective equipment used by security guards.

A memorial site will be set up inside the shopping centre for the public to leave flowers and tributes to the victims, and digital advertising screens will display a black ribbon as a symbol of remembrance and mourning.

Westfield Bondi Junction will open to the public on Thursday for a “community reflection day”, with shops to remain closed. Businesses will be allowed to resume trade on Friday.

Scentre Group chief executive Elliott Rusanow said the centre would be a quiet place for the community to come to pay their respects on Thursday after Saturday’s stabbing attack, which claimed the lives of six people.

Counselling will be available on Thursday.

Rusanow said Scentre Group had offered the families of the victims the opportunity to visit the scene on Tuesday for some private reflection.

“It was a very emotional experience,” he said.

Shoppers and staff working on Saturday were forced to abandon their cars and belongings as the shopping centre became a crime scene.

Since Tuesday, Westfield staff and police have escorted people back into the centre to retrieve their items and cars, although the businesses have remained shut and the centre closed to the public.

Scentre Group chief executive Elliott Rusanow held a press conference about the plans to reopen Westfield Bondi Junction after Saturday’s stabbing attack.

Watch the press conference below.