The sun had barely set over Sydney’s Bondi Beach, when horror unfolded at the Hanukkah celebration. A father and son, armed with licensed firearms, opened fire on a crowd of hundreds gathered for the Jewish holiday, killing at least 15 people and injuring more than 40 others. The perpetrators have been identified as Sajid Akram, 50, who was killed by police at the scene, and his 24-year-old son Naveed Akram, who remains in a critical condition in hospital after being shot by police.

The father-son dynamic here is no coincidence; it speaks to how hatred is often inherited

The attack is Australia’s deadliest mass shooting in nearly three decades, a stark anomaly in a nation with stringent gun laws. Yet beyond the immediate calls for tighter controls –worthy as they are – the Bondi tragedy exposes a deeper, more insidious threat: the familial roots of extremism. The father-son dynamic here is no coincidence; it speaks to how hatred is often inherited, nurtured in the quiet corners of home life, and passed down like a poisoned heirloom.

As someone whose own father, Seán O’Callaghan, plunged fully into the abyss of extremism before clawing his way out, I find this aspect profoundly unsettling.

Seán grew up in a staunch republican household in Tralee, County Kerry, where his father – my grandfather – was interned at the Curragh Camp during World War II for IRA activities. From an early age, Seán was steeped in a culture of resentment;........

© The Spectator