Deepfake and manipulated images of a survivor of the Bondi Beach terror attack, showing him holding an Oscar while covered in blood, spread “like wildfire” online within hours of the shooting, Arsen Ostrovsky told Australia’s royal commission on antisemitism and social cohesion on Monday.
Ostrovsky, who was wounded in the deadly Hanukkah terror attack at Sydney’s Bondi Beach, appeared before the commission as it opened its third round of hearings, focused on the spread of hate speech on social media and in traditional media.
Arsen Ostrovsky speaks after the terror attack
(Video: NEWS 9)
The commission was established after 15 people were murdered in the Hanukkah terror attack.
According to ABC Australia, Ostrovsky told the commission that an image of his injuries, posted on X about two hours after the shooting, triggered a wave of abusive comments and manipulated images.
“There were also messages of support and solidarity, but almost immediately there was a wave of hate, abuse, incitement and defamation, alongside manipulations created using artificial intelligence,” he said. “It was surreal to be in the hospital and at the same time see all this material being circulated.”
Ostrovsky told the commission that social media users called him a “trauma tourist” and a “false flag attack actor,” while others claimed the blood seen in his photo was not blood at all, but ketchup or paint.
The commission was also shown an AI-generated image depicting Ostrovsky sitting on the ground and laughing while another person painted his face red.
“All of this happened while I was literally being prepared to go into the operating room,” he told the inquiry.
Arsen Ostrovsky
(Photo: Sky News Australia screenshot)
ABC Australia also reported that Ostrovsky told the commission some of the content remains online, including a YouTube video accusing him of being a “crisis actor” and an “intelligence agency asset.”
Ostrovsky, who has a large following on several social media platforms, said he tries to ignore the abuse but cannot fully escape it.
“I try my best to ignore it... but it is impossible,” he said. “This thing is trying to completely erase my experience and the trauma I went through.”
He described the abuse campaign against him as “relentless” and “cruel.”
The commission also heard testimony from a Jewish mother who asked to remain anonymous. The 47-year-old Sydney woman said she too had faced difficulties trying to remove antisemitic content from social media.
She said her daughter, then in seventh grade, experienced antisemitic abuse at school in June 2024. The harassment later moved online, when a TikTok account posted a video showing her daughter’s image alongside the phrase “g@s inhl3r.”
According to the mother, symbols and substitute characters were used to write the slur “gas inhaler” in a way designed to evade the platform’s automatic filtering and blocking mechanisms. She said her daughter was “devastated” by the video.
New South Wales police determined that the video had been posted from an account created by one of the Jewish girl’s close friends.
Several social media platforms were granted permission to appear before the royal commission, including Google, Meta, TikTok and LinkedIn.
Addressing the commission on Monday, counsel assisting the inquiry Richard Lancaster said some platforms had cooperated more than others with requests for information.
Lancaster said Gab Social had been “openly hostile” in its dealings with the commission. He said a representative of the platform described it as an “American company, run by Americans,” that would “publish what it wants, when it wants.”
“I do not answer to Australian bureaucrats, and Gab does not answer to state censors,” Gab founder and CEO Andrew Torba wrote in a statement posted on X in May, after he was ordered to hand over documents to the commission. “The Australian government has officially declared war on free speech and threatened me with 12 months in prison for exposing its plans.”