Tag Archives: oceania

Budget airline VietJet launches new flights to Perth and Adelaide

Budget airline VietJet has launched new flight routes connecting Ho Chi Minh City to Perth and Adelaide.

The flights will begin on November 21, with five return flights per week.

The expansion means the airline now flies to five Australian cities, after flights to Sydney, Brisbane and Melbourne began earlier this year.

LIVE UPDATES: Only a few top Hamas commanders knew of attack, official says

South Australian Tourism Minister Zoe Bettison said she was hopeful the announcement would more Vietnamese tourists headed to Adelaide.

"The Vietnamese economy is going quite strongly and they're keen to travel," she said.

The flights from Ho Chi Minh City take off at 6.35am (GMT+7), land in Perth at 14.20, and after that continue flying to Adelaide and land in Adelaide at 21.10 on Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Thursdays and Sundays.

In the opposite direction, the flights depart from Adelaide at 7:25am, land in Perth at 8:55 (local time) and depart from Perth at 9:55 (local time), land in Ho Chi Minh City at 15:40 (local time) on Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays.

The South Australian government hopes the airline will soon announce direct flights to Adelaide without the stopover in Perth.

Francis Wong from the South Australia Vietnamese Business Council said direct flights would mean more tourism into South Australia.

"We say all roads lead to Vietnam in Asia – especially in the ASEAN region – so it's really good to have the direct connections with Vietnam," he said.

VietJet has also announced a further four new international routes to destinations in China, Taiwan, and South Korea.

Armed fugitive's final moments revealed before he was shot by police

There may be "tactical reasons" why the final moments of a man shot dead by police after a multi-day two-state manhunt weren't captured on camera, a coroner has been told.

Stanley Turvey was brandishing a sawn-off shotgun at police when he was shot during a confrontation with special operations officers in northern Victoria in September.

But the officers, who had been in the Shepparton area for two days following an earlier stand-off with Turvey, weren't wearing body cameras and a Taser also used to shoot him didn't have a Taser-cam.

READ MORE: Shocking dashcam shows festival attendees shot point-blank

Stanley Turvey

"One anticipates there may be tactical reasons for those decisions," Lindsay Spence told the Victorian Coroners Court.

Spence is counsel assisting State Coroner John Cain ahead of a mandatory inquest into Turvey's death.

A brief of evidence, which includes statements from all officers involved in the incident, is expected to take until February 29 next year to complete.

The court heard Turvey had a lengthy criminal history.

After serving a nearly three-year sentence for armed robbery in Victoria, Turvey was immediately taken into custody and convicted of rape in Queensland and released in December 2022 on a five-year suspended sentence.

He returned to Victoria where officers were granted a firearms prohibition order, served on him in July.

LIVE UPDATES: Shorten calls Pro-Palestine protest 'un-Australian'

During a routine compliance check on September 18, Turvey armed himself with a double barrel sawn-off shotgun which he pointed at two officers.

Officers demanded he drop the weapon, retreated and sought cover when he threatened to fire the gun.

When police refused to give him a cigarette unless he dropped the weapon, Turvey fired a single shot into the air and then began to rummage through two police cars.

Unable to start them, he took a third car and drove down the street, crashing it into a fence.

Over the following day he threatened multiple people with the weapon while demanding they drive him to and from NSW.

Among them was a construction worker who was repeatedly punched to the ground.

On September 20 Turvey went to a remote, isolated property near Shepparton where, while cleaning his shotgun, he told the resident he wanted to die and that would "only end one way".

READ MORE: Hamas threatens to execute Israeli hostages in Gaza

Air wing, special operations, armed crime and fugitive taskforce officers, in the area since the earlier stand-off, went to the property and tried to get the occupant to safety.

Turvey appeared and told officers "I'm going to shoot you or you're going to shoot me".

He approached quickly and got within a metre or two of an officer and the home's occupant.

Fearing Turvey would fire the weapon at the pair, or swing it back toward himself, a special operations officer fired his rifle multiple times, striking Turvey.

The other officer fired his Taser, which also struck Turvey.

Despite medical treatment he could not be revived.

No date has been set for the inquest.

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'On the phone as she died': US mum shot shielding son from Hamas

Ilan Troen said he was on the phone with his daughter in Israel when she was shot and killed by Hamas gunmen while shielding her son from their bullets.

Troen, a professor emeritus from Brandeis University in Massachusetts, said his daughter and son-in-law, Deborah and Shlomi Matias, were killed by Hamas militants over the weekend. Troen's grandson, 16-year-old Rotem Matias, was shot but will survive, Troen said.

The killings came after the Gaza-based militant group launched devastating attacks on Israel early Saturday.

READ MORE: Israel festival revellers shot at point-blank range, video shows

Deborah and Shlomi Matias were killed by Hamas militants over the weekend.

At least 11 US citizens have died in the conflict in Israel, President Joe Biden said in a Monday statement, adding there are also Americans who remain unaccounted for. It is also "likely" that Americans are among those being held hostage by Hamas, the statement said.

As desperate families continue to wait for information about missing loved ones, Troen said he has "too much information" about what happened when the gunmen burst into his daughter's home.

"We were on the phone with Deborah as she was killed," Troen said. "We were on the phone the entire day with our grandson, Rotem, as he lay first under her body, and then found a place to escape under a blanket in a laundry."

Rotem was shot in the stomach, Troen said, but will recover.

"The brunt of the shot was borne by his mother," he said. "The terrorists who came, they had explosives and blew up the front door to their house and then blew out the front door to their so-called safe room."

Rotem hid for more than 12 hours after he was shot, texting on his phone to communicate with people who were coaching him on how to breathe and how to manage "the blood that was coming out of his abdomen," Troen said, adding Rotem's phone was down to a 4 percent charge when he was rescued.

Deborah and Shlomi Matias were killed by Hamas gunmen. Their son, Rotem, survived the attack.

Deborah Matias attended the Rimon School of Music in the Tel Aviv area, where she met her husband, Troen told CNN.

"Deborah was a child of light and life," Troen said. "She, rather than becoming a scientist or a physician, she said to me one day, 'Dad, I have to do music, because it's in my soul.'"

Troen spoke to CNN from Be'er Sheva, Israel, where he said jet planes flew over his house into Gaza. "This is not a normal war," he said. "It isn't like there's a front and rear."

Troen said the last he heard, Rotem was with family in the hospital.

"He's 16, tough, resilient – he survived this. He'll survive more, but the trauma of this is going to last his lifetime," he said.

Missing Americans

Jacob Ben Senior said his daughter Danielle was attending the Nova music festival near the Gaza-Israel border and has not been heard from since Friday. Ben Senior said he has been calling her phone since Saturday morning but has not been able to reach her.

Born in Los Angeles, Danielle Ben Senior is a 34-year Israeli-American citizen who has lived most of her life in Israel, according to her father. Danielle was working at the Nova festival with a group of event organisers, her father said.

"We are in close contact with the government of Israel as they continue to conduct security operations to locate missing US citizens," Miller, the State Department spokesperson, said.

READ MORE: What you need to know about the Hamas attack on Israel

Danielle Ben Senor was attending the Nova festival and has been reported missing.

A mother and daughter from the Chicago area who were visiting relatives in Israel are also missing following Hamas' attacks and it's feared they are being held hostage, a family member told CNN.

US citizens Judith Tai Raanan and Natali Raanan were visiting relatives in Nahal Oz, a kibbutz that was attacked by Gazan militants on Saturday. The family said they are in touch with the US Embassy.

Judith Raanan's brother Adi Leviatan said he suspected the pair was taken hostage after not hearing from them since the weekend. Natali and Judith arrived in Israel on September 2, he said.

Nahal Oz is in southern Israel, about two and a half kilometres from the Gaza border. Dozens of Gaza fighters took control of a military base nearby, and an IDF spokesperson told CNN there was fighting in Nahal Oz on Sunday.

The Biden administration is "laser-focused" on confirming whether any Americans have been taken hostage by Hamas, deputy national security adviser Jon Finer said during an appearance on CBS News earlier Monday. The US is prepared to offer "expertise on how to address these hostage situations," he said, with more information expected in the coming days.

Israel's Minister of Defence on Monday ordered the "complete siege" of Gaza, cutting off electricity, food, fuel and water to the enclave. This comes as Israel has pounded Gaza with airstrikes and formally declared war on Hamas on Sunday.

More than 680 Palestinians have been killed, according to Gaza's health ministry, and medical care has been complicated by Israel cutting power to the territory.

It's unclear whether any US citizens are among those killed or injured in Gaza.

Israel-Hamas war: What you need to know

  • Israel continues to pound Gaza with airstrikes, and thousands of rockets have rained down on Israel. More than 900 have been killed in Israel, and at least 600 in Gaza.
  • A spokesman declares Hamas will execute Israeli hostages every time an airstrike hits civilian homes in Gaza. They state the surprise attack was launched after years of planning and preparations.
  • Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the Israeli military is going on the offence against Hamas with a force "like never before". More than 300,000 reservists have been activated.
  • Israel has declared a "complete siege" of Gaza, cutting off water, food and power supplies.

'Going okay': Israeli mum's tragic last message to Aussie friends

A family sheltering in a bunker as Hamas militants stormed their community in southern Israel were reportedly killed just after sending a message reassuring their friends in Australia of their safety.

Tamar Kedem-Siman Tov, her husband Johnny, and their three children were locked in their safe room in the Nir Oz kibbutz when the attackers crossed the Israeli border on the weekend, the Sydney Morning Herald has reported.

She sent a message to some close friends in Sydney, Yishai and Mor Lacob.

LIVE UPDATES: Bill Shorten slams Sydney protests as 'un-Australian'

Tamar Kedem-Siman Tov with her husband Johnny and their children Shahar, Arbel, and Omer.

"Hi guys, we got into the shelter in our house, we're all going okay," she wrote at 2.45pm AEDT.

But an hour later she had fallen silent, and the Lacobs were unable to contact her.

"We were trying to speak with people there … people we might know in this area, we were harassing everyone," Mor Lacob told the Herald.

READ MORE: Israel festival revellers shot at point-blank range, video shows

The Lacobs ultimately found out the devastating news that the Tov family's bunker had been breached and they had been among the hundreds of civilians killed in the attacks.

Their deaths have not been independently verified by Nine newspapers but has been reported in Israeli media and tributes have been made on social media.

Mor Lacob said Tamar, a women's rights campaigner and would-be local politician, was a "special woman".

"She always cared about the poor people, always made sure that people less fortunate will have the same opportunities," Lacob said.

READ MORE: Palestinians live in fear as Israel retaliates

Tamar and her wheat-growing husband Johnny had three young children together – daughters Shahar and Arbel, both six, and son Omer, four.

Hundreds of people, mostly civilians, have been killed both in Israel and Gaza since Saturday.

Hamas militants have also claimed to hold 100 kidnapped hostages, whom they have threatened to kill if rockets continue to strike Gaza.

Israel-Hamas war: What you need to know

  • Israel continues to pound Gaza with airstrikes, and thousands of rockets have rained down on Israel. More than 900 have been killed in Israel, and at least 600 in Gaza.
  • A spokesman declares Hamas will execute Israeli hostages every time an airstrike hits civilian homes in Gaza. They state the surprise attack was launched after years of planning and preparations.
  • Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the Israeli military is going on the offence against Hamas with a force "like never before". More than 300,000 reservists have been activated.
  • Israel has declared a "complete siege" of Gaza, cutting off water, food and power supplies.

Israel festival revellers shot at point-blank range, video shows

WARNING: Some readers may find this content distressing

Gaza militants who attacked an all-night music festival in southern Israel shot and killed revellers at point-blank range, then looted their belongings, new car dash cam video verified by CNN reveals.

The video began circulating on social media on Sunday and – alongside footage of harrowing kidnappings from the same event – has been scrutinised by horrified families desperate for news of loved ones missing since a series of coordinated attacks triggered Israel's declaration of war.

Israeli officials counted at least 260 bodies near the site of the Nova festival, outside Re'im, where earlier footage showed carefree partygoers from Israel and overseas dancing in the desert soon after sunrise on Saturday.

READ MORE: Israel vows complete siege of Gaza as it strikes Palestinian territory after incursion by Hamas 

Some survivors are among more than 100 hostages that the militant group Hamas claims to be holding in Gaza, according to friends and family members who have seen them in videos shared on social platforms.

The dash cam video verified by CNN gives a glimpse of the terror as militants took over the festival, preventing some partygoers from leaving with deadly force.

The first clip begins at 9.23am, according to its timecode, just under three hours after the first explosions were reported at the Nova festival.

The video has no audio, but a militant is seen yelling, then pointing his machine gun at a man taking cover next to the car.

It's unclear if the gunman is firing a warning shot, or if he's just shot and injured the civilian, who is then seen being led away. His fate is unknown.

A second individual is seen in the video lying on the ground at the back of another car. The person begins to move and suddenly another militant appears on screen, aims at the person, fires and walks away. The person on the ground stops moving.

READ MORE: Hundreds gather in Sydney for pro-Palestine protest as Opera House lights up in support of Israel

Another video from the dash cam, timestamped at 12.09pm, shows two militants approach the body of the second individual. They rifle through the person's pockets, and one picks something off the body and puts it into his own back pocket.

Less than three minutes later, militants grab a woman out of the back of the car. She is led away, and the militants begin to open another car's trunk and empty a suitcase on the ground to be pilfered.

The video picks up at 12.14pm, with the captured woman running back into view. Her hands in the air, she appears to be waving toward the festival grounds.

Dirt and dust are seen flying as bullets hit the ground around her. Next to the emptied suitcase and open trunk, she takes cover again. Her fate is unknown.

READ MORE: A 'Pearl Harbour' moment: Why didn't Israel's sophisticated border stop attack?

Families search for missing children

Ricarda Louk last saw her daughter Shani lying face down in the back of a ute heading to the Gaza Strip, an isolated coastal enclave of almost 2 million people crammed into 360 square kilometres.

She last spoke to her after hearing rockets and alarms sounding in southern Israel, and phoned her daughter to see if she'd made it to a secure location.

Shani told her mother she was at the festival, held in an open field with few places to hide.

Aerial footage posted on social media showed dozens of cars along the side of the road near the entrance to the festival grounds, some burned, others with windows missing and doors hanging open.

READ MORE: What you need to know about the Hamas attack on Israel

Shani Louk

Shani was trying to reach one of those vehicles, her mother said.

"She was going to her car and they had military people standing by the cars and were shooting so people couldn't reach their cars, even to go away. And that's when they took her," Ricarda told CNN.

The disturbing video of her daughter in the back of the ute and attempts by someone to use Shani's credit card twice in Gaza after the attack are the only hints she has of her daughter's whereabouts.

In the video, she is seen motionless. One gunman, carrying a rocket propelled grenade launcher, has his leg draped over her waist and the other holds a clump of her dreadlocks. "Allahu Akbar," they cheer – meaning "God is great" in Arabic.

Ricarda hopes she will see her daughter again, but the situation is bleak.

"It looks very bad, but I still have hope. I hope that they don't take bodies for negotiations. I hope that she's still alive somewhere. We don't have anything else to hope for, so I try to believe," she said.

Ricarda Louk

Hiding for hours, then …

Like Ricarda Louk, Yakov Argamani last saw his daughter on one of the cellphone videos that have emerged in the aftermath of Saturday's raid.

Noa Argamani, 25, is seen pleading for help from the back of a motorcycle driven by Hamas militants at the festival site.

Her tearful father struggled to find words to convey his shock and grief on seeing the video:

"I couldn't believe it … I didn't want to believe it," Yakov told CNN.

Noa was attending the festival with her boyfriend, Avinatan Or, who is also seen being led away by militants.

Noa Argamani, an Israeli woman, who was kidnapped by Hamas militants with her boyfriend.

Noa's childhood friend Shlomit Marciano, who was helping comfort her family when they spoke to CNN, said the text messages they received suggest their friends were hiding for hours as militants rampaged through the festival site.

Or texted Noa's father around 10 a.m. to say the couple were safe, almost four hours after the first reports of an attack. Other friends also texted, begging for help, Marciano said.

"Since that, no contact. We suppose they were abducted at 12. They probably were hiding for three, four hours begging for help. They started hiding after hearing the massacres and the shooting. And then (the militants) found them," Marciano said.

Now Yakov is relying on his faith, Marciano said.

"He believes in God. He's praying that she's okay. And she will come back to him, to the family and to us safely. She's their only child," Marciano said.

Hundreds protest as landmarks light up for Israel

Hundreds of Palestine supporters have marched through Sydney in protest against the Opera House being lit up in blue and white in support of Israel following attacks by militant group Hamas.

The conflict has so far killed at least 700 people in Israel, including 260 at a music festival, and seen around 130 people taken hostage.

Israel has responded by launching a devastating barrage on the Gaza Strip, killing at least 560 Palestinians, including dozens of children.

READ MORE: A 'Pearl Harbour' moment: Why didn't Israel's sophisticated border stop attack?

A pro-Palestinian rally outside Sydney Town Hall, October 9, 2023.

Israel on Monday vowed a complete siege of the region, having already cut power to the densely populated enclave, making it increasingly difficult for health workers to treat the more than 2200 injured people in Gaza.

About 6pm on Monday, hundreds of people began gathering outside Sydney Town Hall before moving through the CBD towards the Opera House.

People carried Palestinian flags, wearing black, white, red and green, and carrying banners with messages such as "Apartheid, wrong in South Africa, wrong in Palestine" and "Free Palestine".

"Resistance is justified as long as more than 2 million Palestinians in Gaza are forced to live in an open air prison for the past 15 years," one speaker with family in Gaza said, condemning "massacres, pogroms, land confiscation".

"As long as Palestinians in Jerusalem and the surrounding cities are being ethnically cleansed and forced to live under the boots of the Zionist fascist occupation day in and day out for the past 75 years."

The Nakba, or catastrophe, refers to the mass displacement of Palestinians during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war.

One of the march's organisers, Josh Lee, said lighting the Opera House in an expression of support for Israel was "disgusting", given the Palestinians were oppressed victims.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese had earlier called for the march to be called off out of respect for the loss of life in Israel since Saturday.

"The actions of Hamas in this is completely indefensible," Albanese told 2GB radio this afternoon, adding that "this was people killing innocent civilians".

Greens state MP for Newtown Jenny Leong criticised the prime minister's comments and the lighting of the Opera House "in support of those bombing Palestinian people in Gaza into oblivion".

"Disgraceful to see political leaders fail to recognise the complexity and reality of this human rights and humanitarian crisis," she said.

There was a heavy police presence keeping an eye on the march, with both mounted officers and some on foot.

EXPLAINED: What you need to know about the Hamas attack on Israel

A pro-Palestinian rally outside Sydney Town Hall, October 9, 2023.

The group organising the march, Palestine Action Group Sydney, said it would be a "mass, peaceful protest" and police also described the event as "peaceful".

A man who attended the march with an Israeli flag was arrested and removed "to prevent a breach of the peace", police said.

He was issued with a move-on order and wasn't facing any further action.

Video footage posted to X shows the man, with his flag in a tennis bag after he had waved it earlier, exchanging words with some members of the pro-Palestinian crowd near Town Hall before walking away without further incident.

Some estimates put crowd numbers at about 1000.

Sydney's Jewish community said police had warned them to stay away from the Opera House while it was lit up.

"NSW Police and Community Security Group (CSG) are urging the community not to attend the Sydney Opera House precinct or Town Hall this evening," the NSW Jewish Board of Deputies said in a statement.

"Community members already in the CBD should also be vigilant as protesters are likely to seek to march from Town Hall to the Sydney Opera House.

READ MORE: Family plea after video shows unconscious woman in Hamas' hands

"The events tonight may pose a risk to the safety of community members and you are strongly urged not to attend.

"NSW Police and the CSG have confirmed unequivocally that it is safe to continue to participate in all official Jewish communal events and to send your children to school in the usual way."

The Opera House was one of several Australian landmarks, including Parliament House in Canberra and the Adelaide Oval, to be lit up in blue and white on Monday in support of Israel.

In Melbourne, Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles attended a Jewish community gathering where he said Australia's "heart breaks for Israel" .

"We do condemn Hamas in the strongest possible terms. Theirs is an ideology of terror and these are acts which are of the most profound evil," he said.

"And as Israel acts to defend herself, and to seek the protection and the liberation of her citizens to act against Hamas, Australia stands by her side.

"And in 2023, it is time around the world that there is an acknowledgement that Israel has the right to exist in peace and in security."

Israel-Hamas war: What we know so far

  • Hamas militants crossed into Israel by land, sea and air in the early hours of Saturday morning. The militants infiltrated 22 towns and army bases. Civilians and soldiers were killed and taken hostage.
  • At least 700 people have reportedly been killed in Israel.
  • Israel formally declared war on Hamas on Sunday and has been pounding Gaza with airstrikes.
  • More than 550 Palestinians have reportedly died. Hamas has fired over 4000 rockets into Israel.
  • The Wall Street Journal today reported Iran helped Palestinian militants plan their shock assault. Iran has denied it was involved in the attack, but has supported it as "wholly legitimate". A US official said it had no "direct information" linking Iran to the attacks.