Powerful message delivered at USYD vigil

The University of Sydney, led by its Jewish staff and students, held a moving National Day of Mourning event at midday on January 22, with speakers including staff member Sabina Kleitman, whose 87-year-old father, Alex Kleytman, was murdered in last month’s Bondi Chanukah terror attack.

Fifteen memorial candles were lit, the audience of more than 100 observed a minute’s silence, the uni’s Jewish chaplain Rabbi Eli Feldman and staff member Dr Joseph Toltz recited memorial prayers, and concluded the ceremony by singing Oseh Shalom and Waltzing Matilda.

Sabina Kleitman showed the last photo ever taken of her parents together – smiling at the Chanukah by the Sea event moments before the gunfire began – a photo that was taken by Peter Meagher, who like Alex, was murdered at the event, along with 13 others.

“We immigrated to Australia in 1992 from the former Soviet Union,” she said.

“My father survived the Nazis, and survived persecution [in Russia and Ukraine]. His present to us was to live in a country which was a safe haven for us, which it was for many years. But his life was taken in a bloodbath at Bondi Beach.