A grandfather is being hailed a hero after he was caught on video hurling a brick at the Bondi Beach terrorists – just moments before he ended up being shot dead in Australia’s worst mass shooting in decades.
Reuven Morrison, 62, was one of at least four unarmed onlookers who tried to stop the ISIS-inspired father and son who killed 15 people during a Hanukkah celebration on the packed beach Sunday.
Harrowing footage captured him charging forward in a desperate attempt to halt the carnage soon after the two gunmen opened fire.
Reuven Morrison was shot and killed by the gunmen during the Bondi Beach Hanukkah celebration attack. X/pinchegorro“He managed to throw bricks,” his grief-stricken daughter, Sheina Gutnick, told CBS News of her dad, a proud Jew celebrating Hanukkah.
“He was screaming at the terrorist, and protecting his community, he was shot dead,” she said.
“If there was one way for him to go on this Earth, it would be fighting a terrorist. There was no other way he would be taken from us. He went down fighting, protecting the people he loved most.”
“Everyone [who] knew him knew the incredible man that was just too big for this world. The light that he added, his absolute immense and endless generosity, his sense of humor. He was just the most incredible person,” the daughter added.
Morrison, who had fled the Soviet Union for Australia, was among the 15 people murdered during the heinous attack.
“My father was murdered. In cold blood. Shot for being Jewish,” his daughter said.
Morrison, who originally came from the USSR, was later shot and killed in the attack. Chabad Bondi“Ripped from his wife, daughter, son-in-law, and dear grandchildren. Leaving a gaping, heaving wound of sorrow.”
Morrison was among a handful of heroes who tried to take down the two gunmen during the massacre, which lasted at least 10 minutes.
Boris Gurman, 69, and his 61-year-old wife, Sofia, were caught on video trying to wrestle one of the gunman before they, too, were shot dead.
The dashcam footage showed one shooter wrestling for a barreled weapon with an older man in a lavender shirt and shorts, before both fall heavily to the ground behind a silver hatchback car. JENNY via REUTERS
The couple, who have not yet been identified, were also filmed tackling one of the terrorists to stop him before apparently being shot dead. JENNY via REUTERSAnother man, Ahmed al Ahmed — a Muslim father of two — eventually charged one of the gunmen from behind and disarmed him, surviving despite getting shot numerous times.
Morrison’s daughter has since blasted the Australian government for not doing more to stamp out antisemitism in the lead up to the bloodshed.
“We have been begging and begging for action and it has fallen on deaf ears,” she said.
“They’ve had the warning signs for so long.”
