Bondi Photographer Discovered He Was Jewish Minutes Before He Was Murdered

One of the Bondi Beach terror attack victims learned he was Jewish only moments before being murdered, and embraced that identity in the final minutes of his life, according to COLlive.

Peter Meagher Hy’d, known to friends and family as “Marzo,” was a former New South Wales police detective and a widely respected community photographer. Until that day, he was generally believed to be non-Jewish.

According to the report, during the first-night Chanukah event at Bondi Beach, Chabad bochur Shalom Druin, along with other bochurim and Rabbi Eli Schlanger Hy’d, were offering passersby the chance to put on tefillin. As they were about to leave for another Chanukah event, Druin noticed a man holding a camera and approached him to ask if he was Jewish.

“I’m not Jewish,” the man replied, “but my grandmother was.”

Druin then asked whether the grandmother was on his mother’s side or his father’s side. When Meagher answered that she was his mother’s mother, Druin explained, “If that’s the case, you’re Jewish-completely Jewish.” Meagher was encouraged to put on tefillin, and he agreed, performing the mitzvah on the spot.

Roughly ten minutes later, the terror attack began. Meagher was murdered Al Kiddush Hashem, sanctifying Hashem’s Name. His final act in this world was the fulfillment of a mitzvah.

Additional details were later shared by Bondi resident Chavi Israel, who survived the attack. She described the experience of her friend, Chana Michla Deitz, who was also present. Deitz was lying on the ground with her daughter near Meagher and witnessed his final moments.

Unaware that Meagher was Jewish, Deitz instinctively began reciting Shema Yisrael on his behalf. She later said she felt a powerful and unexplainable urge to do so. In the chaos that followed, she davened intensely, pleading that it would not be her or her daughter’s final day. Bchasdei Hashem, both survived the massacre.