Network of Teens Allegedly Plotted to Target Jews After Church Stabbing
A group of teenagers in Australia discussed buying weapons and attacking Jewish people in the days after a bishop was stabbed in a church in Sydney, according to reports.
Five adolescents were charged last week on multiple charges including conspiring to engage in or planning a terrorist act. The defendants—all between the ages of 14 and 17—belonged to a network that, according to police, also included the 16-year-old accused of stabbing the Assyrian Orthodox Bishop Mar Mari Emmanuel during a livestreamed service in his church.
According to a police fact sheet tendered to a local court, four of the teenagers charged last used the encrypted messaging app Signal to plan their attack, The Daily Telegraph reports. “I wanna die and I wanna kill … I’m just excited,” one 17-year-old allegedly wrote on April 20, five days after the church stabbing, later asking: “Is your plan to get caught or die or escape?”