St Ives: Man, 20, charged after allegedly making ‘gun gesture’ at worshippers near Sydney synagogues

A man is set to face court charged with allegedly making threatening gestures at worshippers near two synagogues in Sydney’s upper north shore, the latest in another wave of anti-Jewish incidents across the city.

Ku-ring-gai police officers were told a passenger inside a car allegedly made a gun gesture with his fingers at a man walking along Link Road at St Ives at about 12.30pm on Saturday, January 4.

Police will allege in court the car continued to drive along the road and the passenger allegedly made the same gesture toward another man at a place of worship.

The second man reported the alleged incidents to police that day.

Link Road is home to the Chabad North Shore synagogue and Kehillat Masada Synagogue. It is understood a gesture was made towards a man who had left the Chabad North Shore synagogue.

After inquiries, police arrested a 20-year-old man at a home in North Turramurra at about 11pm on Monday.

He was taken to Hornsby Police Station and was charged with stalk or intimidate intend fear physical harm.

The 20-year-old was granted conditional bail to appear at Hornsby Local Court later this month.

The charges come after a new wave of “Jew-hatred” rocks Sydney’s eastern suburbs, with the a car in Queens Park sprayed with the words “f*** the Jews”.

It is the third alleged incident of anti-Semitism in less than three months to scar the leafy Sydney region, with multiple cars and properties in Woollahra — a prominent community of Jewish-Australians — vandalised with anti-Israel and anti-Jewish slogans in December and November.

Slogans such as “kill Israel” and “death 2 Israel (sic.)“ were sprayed on the cars in December and a vehicle was torched. Twn cars were vandalised with anti-Israel graffiti and another was set alight in November.

The December incident prompted NSW Premier Chris Minns to equip NSW Police with the same level of resources granted to them after the October 7 attack on Israel to “ensure the that the public feel safe at a time of heightened community tension”.

Mr Minns said after the attack that the “despicable people” behind the “anti-Semitic hate crime” would be met with a “zero tolerance response by NSW Police” and his Government.

Meanwhile, in neighbouring eastern Sydney suburbs, dozens of e-bikes defaced with anti-Semitic graffiti — including Nazi swastikas — are being driven and dumped in what Jewish people say is a blatant attempt to intimidate residents with “mobile racist billboards”.

Some of the Lime bikes bear the slogans “Israel is hell”, “Israel is a terrorist state” and “Zionists are Nazis” and have been dumped around Bondi, Rose Bay Coogee, Kensington, Maroubra and Randwick suburbs, near large populations of Jewish people.

The Australian Jewish Association told The Daily Telegraph it had received “hundreds” of complaints about the bikes and that the ride-share company that owns them has ignored complaints to clean them up.

AJA chief executive Robert Gregory said the bikes are being deliberately placed near synagogues “to intimidate the Jewish community”.

“If the graffiti was on a public building, it would be removed but Lime bikes and others have created a loophole that vandals are exploiting,” he told the tabloid. Councils and police cannot clean the bikes as they are privately owned by Lime.

“The share bike companies are effectively providing permanent billboards to spread hate and division and target the Jewish community. “

In a statement to the paper, a Lime spokesperson said the company had a zero-tolerance for anti-social behaviour and was”horrified” by the vandalism around Sydney. It thanked the community for alerting its team to the vandalism.