Yitzi Loewenthal, an 18-year-old bochur at Yeshiva Gedola Melbourne, was threatened at knifepoint and punched in the stomach while on mivtzoim in the Melbourne suburb of Bentleigh.

Yitzi and another bochur spend each Friday visiting Jewish homes and businesses along Centre Road and the surrounding streets, offering Yidden the opportunity to put on tefillin and distributing Shabbos candles and challah.

At approximately 1:35 p.m., Yitzi approached a 69-year-old man on a residential street and asked whether he happened to be Jewish. The man responded angrily, swore at him and told him to stop bothering him.

Yitzi wished him a good day and walked away, continuing to knock on doors further along the street with his partner.

The man remained nearby, watching the two bochurim as they continued their route. As Yitzi emerged from one of the homes, the man circled back and advanced toward him, shouting obscenities and threats while holding a knife in his right hand.

“Coming out of the house, this man walked towards me,” Yitzi told Australia’s Channel 7. “He was yelling at me. He was saying, ‘I want to kill you. I want to kill your friend.’ He was cursing, and he had a knife in his hand.”

With his hands raised, Yitzi slowly backed away and attempted to de-escalate the confrontation as the armed man continued advancing. He then stopped retreating and stood his ground.

The man walked directly up to Yitzi, continued threatening to hurt him and punched him in the stomach.

Yitzi called Australia’s emergency number at 1:48 p.m. By 2:04 p.m., Victoria Police detectives had detained the man and arranged to take Yitzi’s statement in person.

Police said the man was searched and two pocket knives were recovered. No charges had been announced as of Sunday, and the investigation remained ongoing.

The attack comes amid a sharp rise in antisemitic threats and violence across Australia, with a federal royal commission currently investigating antisemitism and social cohesion following the deadly Bondi terror attack in December.

Anti-Defamation Commission chairman Dr. Dvir Abramovich, who publicized the attack and later met Yitzi, said the incident showed how dangerous it had become to be visibly Jewish in Melbourne.

“A knife for a question, that is the going rate in Melbourne for being openly Jewish,” Abramovich said. “When ‘are you Jewish?’ becomes fighting words, when a kippah becomes a bullseye, when a young man doing a mitzvah before Shabbat is allegedly met with a knife, every alarm in this state should be screaming.”

After completing his police statement, Yitzi picked up his tefillin and resumed his route, knocking on more doors and helping additional Yidden put on tefillin before Shabbos.

Abramovich met Yitzi following the attack and described him as “a gibor,” and “a brave, mature, clear-eyed young Jewish man who looked hatred in the face and chose light.”

During their meeting, Abramovich put on tefillin on camera while standing beside Yitzi.

“Australia is known to be this very safe country, and I’m an overseas student,” Yitzi said. “I chose to come here because it has a great reputation, and I was attacked for the way I look, for my religion, which was shocking.”

“What I believe is that the answer to violence is not violence,” he added. “The answer to violence is kindness.”