On December 14, I woke up to more than a dozen missed calls, texts, and news links. Bondi Beach, my Bondi Beach, had been ripped apart by a terrorist attack at a Hanukkah celebration. I watched the news on television from my home in Miami and followed social media accounts of the chaos unfolding, knowing there were many dead and injured.

I am a Bondi baby, and lived on Sir Thomas Mitchell Road, a stone’s throw from the beach before moving to Rose Bay. My grandfather was one of the first students at Bondi Beach Public School, situated steps from the iconic beach. It was my playground for the first 40 years of my life.

Instead of watching people enjoy the fun and sun, I was gripped with overwhelming fear that family or friends would be among the dead or wounded. My sister, my niece and nephews, my cousins, my friends and their children. Were they safe? Were they dead? It was the middle of the night in Australia. Whom can I call?

I watched footage of two males on a rampage with rifles, shooting relentlessly, people running for their lives. Hiding from bullets wherever they could. This was just unimaginable. Not at the most peaceful place on earth. Not at my Bondi Beach, the most photographed beach in the world.

How can this be happening? I’ve walked the beach a million times. Often meeting a friend or two for coffee, lunch, a swim, or to watch a sunset and soak in the magnificence of it all . Long before the 2000 Olympics introduced Bondi Beach to the world as the volleyball venue, my children made tiny footprints in the sand, built sandcastles, and savored moments of pure joy and innocence.

The purity of Bondi Beach means everything to my family. I left for America years ago, but Sydney is still my home, my community, and Bondi Beach is my heart.

It’s the most famous beach in Australia with approximately 2.9 million visitors a year. It is different because it belongs to everyone. It’s where locals, visitors, backpackers, families, surfers, and strangers share the same sand, the same light, the same sense of safety. It is one of the few places in the world where everybody exists side-by-side, no gates, no exclusivity, just people.

The first day of Hanukkah was supposed to be a gathering of joy, song and celebration, but the peace was shattered by a father and son on a shooting rampage fueled with embedded hate of “Jews.”

I might live a half world away, but family and friends in Sydney have kept me abreast of the numerous acts of violence and antisemitic incidents in the past two years. A Jewish deli was set on fire; a caravan was found loaded with explosives and notes listing synagogues with antisemitic slurs.

A Jewish childcare center was firebombed and spray painted with coarse references to Jews. Multiple synagogues and Jewish own businesses have been defaced with swastikas, Nazi slogans and antisemitic slurs. Personal vehicles and property have been damaged with graffiti and antisemitic slurs.

The government was playing down these events until finally it erupted in the death of 16 with another 40 injured. From a holocaust survivor to a 10-year-old, hatred had no limits. Minutes seemed like hours before I learned my immediate family was safe. Being such a close knit community, though, everyone knows someone who was injured or dead. For me, it was someone who once worked for my father. Gone.

Marian, my best friend for more than 40 years, lives just blocks from Bondi Beach. She was at the beach that morning as is her norm and intended to go back that evening. For some reason she didn’t.

From a distance she saw all the chaos and confusion playing out. Over the phone from a half-world apart we shared a million tears. Why? Because Australians enjoy Australia. No guns allowed. Living by the rules of the country.

There was a vigil at the Bondi Pavilion the next day, flowers piled on top of more flowers as people from many Australian communities stood together in grief and solidarity.

As we grieve the lives of those stolen by this senseless antisemitic attack, I hope and pray that My Beautiful Bondi Beach can return to being a place of warmth, laughter, and light. Echoing with children’s laughter and the joy of families, a sanctuary that honors both memory and hope.