A man who murdered his wife in front of his daughter stood in the dock and said "I adore you my daughters I love you so much" after being sentenced to at least 18 years in jail.
Haydar Haydar, 61, who killed his wife and the mother of his four children, Salwa Haydar, 45, stood and read a note after his sentence was delivered in the NSW Supreme Court on Friday.
In the court was the pair's youngest daughter Ola Haydar, who tried to intervene as her father stabbed her mother at least 30 times in her Bexley townhouse in March 2015.
"I would like to let everyone know that, when I did what I did, I was not normal at all and I was totally insane.
"I regret that. I'm not exaggerating if I say I cry every day, guilt is eating me," Haydar said.
"The stance of my daughters whom I used to adore and I still love is as bad as my stance as I was when I was insane."
Members of the gallery wept and Justice Peter Garling intervened to stop Haydar from continuing.
"I love you all. I adore you my daughters. I love you so much and I am very, very sorry," Haydar shouted.
In delivering his sentence, Justice Garling described Haydar's attack on his wife as "frenzied, sustained and brutal", occurring in a place where she was "entitled to be and feel safe and secure".
Haydar had shown a "lack of respect for the value of his wife's life", Justice Garling said.
"It was of great ferocity and persistence. It was the offender's intention to kill the deceased," Justice Garling said.
"The attack was persistent not withstanding the daughter's attempts to stop it."
Haydar, who worked as a taxi driver and interpreter, had sought to be convicted of the lesser charge of manslaughter, claiming he was substantially impaired at the time due to a depressive illness.
But after a trial earlier this year - during which his children went through the harrowing ordeal of giving evidence - he was found guilty of murder.
Haydar and his wife had a tumultuous relationship and, in the years before her death, it deteriorated.
They decided to separate and bought their own homes. Before the murder, Haydar was still living at his wife's townhouse, although his wife had told him she wanted him to move out.
Erroneously believing that his wife was having an affair after reading text messages she had sent to her colleague, Haydar returned unexpectedly to his wife's home after a trip overseas.
After an argument with his wife, he ferociously stabbed her to death as his daughter, then 18, tried to intervene and was cut herself.
"[I was] saying 'What are you doing? Oh my god, you're going to kill her,' " Ms Haydar said as she gave evidence against her father.
Haydar later walked into a police station, with his hands covered in blood, and told the constable on duty: "My wife, I just stabbed my wife. I can't feel anything."
He told a psychologist he had no memory of what triggered the attack but claimed he had found the knife in her handbag.
However, Justice Garling labelled him an "unreliable historian" and did not accept his claims.
As the sentence was delivered, Haydar sat hunched in the dock with his head down.
Justice Garling accepted that Haydar had shown genuine remorse and noted that his psychiatric condition at the time of the murder lowered his moral culpability.
Haydar was jailed for at least 16 years for murder, and at least 18 months for wounding his daughter.
He will be eligible for parole in 2033.