A Muslim man who tackled one of the gunmen who killed at least 16 people during a mass shooting at Bondi Beach in Sydney, Australia, said he doesn’t regret his actions.
Ahmed al Ahmed sustained five gunshot wounds during the attack, mostly to his left arm. Video footage circulating on social media shows al Ahmen quickly sneaking up on one of the shooters and grabbing him. There is a brief struggle before the hero wrests the rifle away from the assailant, knocking him to the ground.
This is Ahmed Al Ahmed. He is a 43 year old man and owner of a fruit shop in Sutherland, Australia.
— Montana Tucker (@montanatucker) December 14, 2025
Today, he disarmed a terrorist targeting a Hanukkah celebration, already having killed 12 people and injured more thwn 60.
Ahmed is a hero and saved many more lives. pic.twitter.com/4L0pALeiAa
Al Ahmed is currently recovering in the hospital, according to The Sydney Morning Herald:
Ahmed al Ahmed, the hero bystander who tackled and disarmed one of the Bondi shooters on Sunday, has said that despite the immense pain he is in, he does not regret lunging at the gunman. In fact, he would do it again.
“He doesn’t regret what he did. He said he’d do it again. But the pain has started to take a toll on him,” Sam Issa, Ahmed’s migration lawyer, said on Monday night after visiting him.
“He’s not well at all. He’s riddled with bullets. Our hero is struggling at the moment.”
As Ahmed recovers from his first round of surgery at St George Hospital in Kogarah, Issa fears he will lose his left arm.
Ahmed, according to Issa, sustained about five bullet wounds that were sprayed across his left arm, but one that plunged into the back of his left shoulder blade, which he called “weird”, has yet to be extracted.
“He’s a lot worse than expected. When you think of a bullet in the arm, you don’t think of serious injuries, but he has lost a lot of blood,” he said.
After being granted citizenship in 2022, Ahmed feels “indebted” to the Australian community, Issa said.
“Ahmed’s a humble man, he’s not interested in coverage, he just did what he was compelled to do as a human being on that day,” he said. “He gets that gratitude from being in Australia. This is his way of conveying his gratitude for staying in Australia, for being granted citizenship.
“He has really appreciated this community, and he felt that as a member of the community, he had to act that way and contribute.”
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President Donald Trump praised the man for risking his life to prevent the shooter from killing more people.
“In Australia, as you’ve probably read, there’s been a very, very brave person who went and attacked frontally one of the shooters,” Trump said. “[He] saved a lot of lives, a very brave person who is right now in the hospital, pretty seriously wounded.
Members of the anti-gun community are using this shooting to push for more gun control measures, an idea Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese favors.
But what if al Ahmed had been armed? What if other civilians on the scene had been carrying guns? Far fewer innocent people would probably have died in the attack, especially since many of the police officers who showed up froze and failed to engage the shooters.
Unfortunately, Australia’s government believes they should leave people defenseless by infringing on their right to keep and bear arms — even though they clearly are not up to the task of stopping these incidents before they go too far.
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