A 16-yr Western Sydney boy was arrested this week alleged to have been intending an Anzac Day attack. Police have charged him with the (draconian) “doing an act in preparation or planning for a terrorist act” offence. It was originally alleged that police “picked up” on an online conversation between the boy and an “offshore male” only to later be revealed that police were in fact running an “online sting” against him, posing as supporters of “extremists” to discuss procuring a weapon with him, while at the same time working to “deradicalise” him. The arrest has been followed by the usual sensationalised rhetoric of political leaders and security officials.

Hizb ut-Tahrir Australia highlights the following in this regard:

1. This case, like many before it, has all the hallmarks of entrapment. The power and influence imbalance between a 16-yr old boy and professional police officers posing as extremists is obvious. It does not take much to get so young a person to say what you want him to. These entrapment tactics are well documented in other western nations whom Australian officials are always eager to mimic.

2. Anzac Day seems to conveniently provide political and security officials with the opportunity to carry out their well-known “counter-terrorism” performance, regularly need to legitimate and keep afloat the monstrous “counter-terrorism” regime they have erected.

It is worth recalling that last year also gave us an “Anzac Day plot”, with all the now-expected alarmist talk of “imminent threats” and “disrupting an attack”. The result, in the now well-known case of Harun Causevic and others, was that the most of the charges were outright dropped or seriously downgraded – quietly dropped in sharp contrast with the loud manner in which they were made. There was nothing except the hot air of political performance.

3. It has also been revealed that the 16-yr old boy had been in an official “deradicalisation” program involving regular checks by police and referral to counsellors and religious leaders, indicating the depth of this pernicious “counter-terrorism” regime which is terrorising Muslim youth and making examples out of them in the most despicable ways.

4. These realities speak volumes about the so-called deradicalisation programs, which are just a tool in the government terrorism narrative and agenda, and the broader “counter-terrorism” regime. All the while the greatest source of violence in the world and the root cause of the problem, western foreign policy, continues unabated, not even registering in the public debate. This is the greatest indictment of the farcical and non-serious nature of western “counter-terrorism” efforts.

5. Muslim community organisations and leaders should have nothing to do with these deradicalisation programs, whatever funding is dangled in front of them. Oppression will be darkness on the Day of Judgement and the Muslim seeks to keep as far away from oppression as possible, keeping clean his conscience and conduct in front of Allah, the Exalted. On the contrary, we call on the community to expose the reality of these government programs, to speak against these disgraceful tactics used by security and intelligence agencies – little wonder the push for immunity laws – and to stand for the youth, the most vulnerable of our community, who are being ruthlessly targeted for political advantage.

Media Office
Hizb ut-Tahrir Australia
28 April 2016

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