One of the Bondi Beach terror attack suspects was “closely connected” to a convicted ISIS terrorist who was busted in 2019 — but was dropped from suspicion after just six months, a bombshell report revealed.
Naveed Akram, 24 — who is in police custody after he and his father, Sajid, 50, allegedly killed 15 people on Sunday during a Hanukkah celebration — had been an associate of Islamic extremist Isaac El Matari, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation reported.
Matari, 26, was a member of an Islamic State cell that had been planning an attack in Australia before being arrested in 2019, and later sentenced to more than seven years behind bars.
Akram had allegedly been in contact with Matari, who was looking for supporters at the time, but the 24-year-old was not a member of the terror cell when it was busted by police, according to the ABC.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese confirmed that Akram had been on the Australian Security Intelligence Organization’s watchlist in 2019 for six months before he was deemed to not pose an immediate threat to the country.
It remains unclear exactky how closely tied Akram was with Matari and his Sydney-based terror cell.
Despite holding “grandiose ideas” about an attack in Australia, Matari’s plans never manifested to anything more than “a lot of talking,” Justice Peter Garling ruled during the 2021 trial.
Akram and his father’s histories are being thoroughly scrutinized following Sunday’s massacre, including a recent month-long trip they took to the Philippines just weeks before the attack.
Police have opened a probe into why the father and son recently traveled to an area in the Southeast Asian country known as an “ISIS training hotspot” alone without any other relatives, the Daily Telegraph reported.
“It has become a well-trodden path for the Islamic State through Southeast Asia and into the Philippines ever since 2019,” one source told the outlet.
The US Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) warned that ISIS has an active branch in the south of the country — where the government has battled Islamist insurgencies for decades.
The duo’s possible links to ISIS were also flagged when police found two Islamic State flags inside the Akarms’ vehicle, the ABC reported.
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Questions also linger on whether the ASIO or federal investigators ever shared their info or concerns about Akram with the New South Wales Firearms Registry.
Following the shooting, it was revealed that Sajid had been a licensed firearms holder since 2015, NSW Police Commissioner Mal Lanyon told reporters.
“He has six firearms licensed to him. We are satisfied that we have six firearms from the scene yesterday,” he said.
Sajid specifically held a recreational hunting license that gave him permission to have long-range firearms, and he was also a member of a hunting club, the commissioner added.
Lanyon said an investigation is underway to see if Sajid truly was eligible to hold a firearms license in Australia, which has some of the strictest gun laws in the world.
NSW Premier Chris Minns did not comment on the investigation over Sajid’s hunting license, but said the shooting was evidence for stricter gun reform in the country.
“If you’re not a farmer, you’re not involved in agriculture, why do you need these massive weapons that put the public in danger and make life dangerous and difficult for NSW police?” Minns asked as he joined the latest calls for reform.
Sunday’s massacre was the worst gun violence Australia has seen since the 1996 Port Arthur massacre that claimed 35 lives and triggered the country’s crackdown on firearms.
