India issues high alert for Jewish establishments after Sydney terror attack

Earlier today, two gunmen had opened fire at Sydney’s Bondi Beach during a Jewish religious event. According to witnesses, around 50 shots were fired as hundreds of people gathered on the beach for a seaside event to mark the beginning of the Jewish festival.Immediately after the tragic incident in Sydney, the security establishments have increased manpower across the Jewish establishments across the country. “Based on specific intelligence inputs, security has been increased at specific places,” said a senior IPS officer adding that alerts were sounded across the local police stations across India and accordingly security measures were taken.The officer also said that all the anti-terror units were asked to keep an eye on suspicious activities and are also on the lookout for suspected radicalised people who are planning to carry out such strikes.“Alerts had already been issued for the Hanukkah period. These have now been reinforced across all metro cities,” the officer said. Jewish establishments in India have been targeted in the past, most notably during the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks, when 175 people were killed in coordinated strikes carried out by Lashkar-e-Taiba terrorists. The assault on Nariman House (Chabad House) claimed the lives of seven people, including Rabbi Gavriel and Rivka Holtzberg, and remains a grim reminder of the vulnerability of Jewish targets.Threats to Israeli and Jewish interests have persisted since then. In 2012, the wife of the Israeli military attaché was injured in a car bombing in New Delhi, which police linked to Iran. A blast outside the Israeli embassy in 2021 damaged vehicles, with Indian agencies identifying Iran’s IRGC Quds Force as responsible. In 2023, two men were arrested in Pune with explosives, drone equipment and images of Mumbai’s Chabad House on their phones, pointing to continued surveillance and planning of potential attacks on Jewish targets in India.



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