Bondi shooting: Terrorist expert says ISIS using Sydney massacre for global jihadist comeback

Islamic State — once considered one of the world’s most dangerous terrorist groups — is using Sunday’s massacre at Bondi Beach to return to the front ranks of international Islamic extremism, according to a top terrorism expert.

In an article in its weekly magazine published Thursday, Islamic State praised accused murderers Sajid and Naveed Akram as heroes, lions and “the pride of Sydney” but did not claim to have orchestrated the massacre of 15 people at the famous beach.

The Arabic-language publication, al-Naba, is distributed through encrypted message apps outside the reach of conventional search engines. Independent researchers said the latest edition used the Bondi attack as evidence the organisation can outwit Western governments by radicalising recruits and inciting violence through the internet.

The only way the West, which helped destroy ISIS militarily in Syria in 2019, could defeat this new form of “jihad” would be for governments to “shut down the internet” and digital communications “entirely”, according to a summary by the media monitoring arm of the BBC.

“It indicates they are not taking direct responsibility for the attack,” Deakin University terrorism expert Josh Roose told The Nightly. “This has been carried out in their name in their broad rubric of action they encourage.

“They are trying to rebuild as a global movement and to recapture their standing as leaders of the global jihadist surge.”

Released without charge

Anthony Albanese said Friday he had been told by the Office of National Intelligence, Australia’s senior intelligence agency, that a “regular online video feed from ISIS that reinforces that this was an ISIS-inspired attack”.

“Further work is being done by the security agencies around motivation,” he said.

On Thursday social media networks supportive of Islamic State posted videos of the Bondi attack set to religious hymns and verses.

Information about another potentially Islamic-inspired attack led the New South Wales Police on Thursday to arrest seven men driving through a busy Western Sydney shopping district.

The men were due to be released Friday without charge after no weapons were found in their two cars, although they will be monitored while in the state after the police received information they were planning a “possibly violent act” and might go to Bondi.

The men’s names have not been made public and the police could not work out why they drove to Sydney from Victoria, NSW Police Commissioner Mal Lanyon said.

‘Not mucking around’

Australian Federal Police Commissioner Krissy Barrett said the police received information about the men from “partner agencies”, a euphemism sometimes used for the domestic spy agency, ASIO, and believed they had links to “extremist Islamic ideology”.

Police from the Tactical Operations Unit used unmarked four-wheel drives to smash into a Toyota Yaris and a Hyundai i30 being driven by the men through Liverpool’s main shopping district on Thursday evening.

Police officers in military-style uniforms with assault rifles pulled the men from their cars, tied their hands behind their backs with plastic ties and sat them on a footpath facing the wall, according to photos and a video published on social media.

Senior police officers and Premier Chris Minns said the dramatic decision demonstrated a more aggressive approach to violent threats following Sunday’s massacre.

“I am encouraged by the swift response of the NSW police,” Mr Minns said. “You can see that they’re not mucking around. If they perceive a threat, now and in the future, they will take immediate action.”

No guns were found in either of the two cars, but the officer who approved the operation, Deputy Commissioner for Investigations and Counter Terrorism David Hudson, still said they might have been going to collect weapons.

“I can confirm no weapons or firearms were located at the vehicle stop,” Deputy Commissioner Hudson told 2GB Friday morning. “That supports the decision to go early before any potential weapons could be obtained by this crew.”

But no “definitive link” had been found between the men and the Akrams, the father-and-son team accused of conducting Sunday’s attack at Bondi, Mr Lanyon said. Sajid Akram died. His 24-year-old son has been charged with 59 counts of murder, terrorism and other offences.

Mindanao chicken

Immigration records show the two men spent four weeks in November on an island in the Philippines where an Islamic separatist group linked to ISIS operates. An employee at the men’s hotel on the island of Mindanao told a reporter they barely left their room, an assertion questioned by Dr Roose.

“The question is, is it a coincidence they would go to an area known for its jihadist extremism and sit in a hotel for 23 hours a day eating chicken, or is it likely that they at the very least they had meetings and were potentially trained?” he said.

Australian intelligence agencies are likely working with their Filipino counterparts to track the men’s movements through their phones, and access their messages, which are likely encrypted, to determine who they may have communicated with in Mindanao, he said.

The NSW government plans to recall parliament on Monday to ban street protests over the Christmas holidays and introduce a permanent prohibition on the ISIS flag.

On Sunday, flags at all NSW and federal government buildings will be flown at half-mast to honour the dead and injured.

The NSW police pleaded with people to avoid rallies planned on the same day to “save Australia” from “individuals who have publicly vowed to destroy the country”. The protests have been advertised online anonymously.

The events are not legally approved and there would be a “significant policing response to any large-scale public gatherings,” the police said in a written statement Friday afternoon.

“This is not a time for large gatherings that may heighten tension or create further risk to the safety of the community.”