Crime editor Mark Morri on why Sydney’s gang war was never really over

With many of Sydney’s worst gangsters dead, locked up or in exile overseas, the underworld war seemed to quieten down. Mark Morri explains why that was never the case. WATCH episode one of The War: Kill or be killed now.

Sydney’s gangland war never stopped – it just took a breather while a new conflict simmered away under the surface, before exploding to life in the city’s ritzier suburbs.

The first incarnation of The Daily Telegraph’s internationally acclaimed mini docu-series The War detailed how the Alameddine crime clan, with the help of the Comanchero bikie gang, essentially wiped the infamous Hamzy crime family off the map by allegedly killing a number of their kingpins.

Since late 2020 bullets, blood and bodies have filled the streets, with more than 20 people killed – many of them big- name underworld figures, but innocent civilians also caught in the crossfire or shot by mistake.

At one point in August 2022 the murders of lady gangster Lametta Fadlallah and her innocent friend, hairdresser Amy Al-Hazzouri, seemed to put an end to the killing.

With many of Sydney’s worst gangsters dead, locked up or in exile overseas, the underworld war seemed to quieten down.

The Daily Telegraph crime editor Mark Morri has covered Sydney’s gangland war since it began.

But the thirst among Sydneysiders for drugs meant that despite the best efforts of authorities, the violence continued among those involved in the lucrative business.

In early 2023 the violence escalated with a series of drug-related kidnappings involving alleged acts of cruelty and torture that had never before been seen in Australia.

Police allege kidnap victims had their toes and fingers removed, their teeth pulled out and even acid thrown in their faces.

The drug rips continued and the inevitable murders began to follow, resulting in the launch of The War II: Kill or be Killed.

The Daily Telegraph's new mini-series The War II: Kill or be Killed is out now.

This new mini-series includes astounding revelations about who police allege is behind the murder of Comanchero heavyweight Alen Moradian at Bondi Junction last year and a failed assassination of a major bikie figure, Abdul Baghdadi at Kirribilli.

No longer is the bloodshed confined to Sydney’s south-west, with bullets also whizzing through the air of the well-to-do suburbs.

The War II is the culmination of a 12-month investigation by The Daily Telegraph that involved talking to cops, crooks and scouring court documents to unveil previously unreported tensions between one time allies the Comanchero and Haouchar crime families.

But the most explosive revelations are how NSW Police was able to infiltrate all levels of the Sydney underworld and cut a swathe through some of the most powerful crime syndicates, while at the same time stopping multiple murders before they could be carried out.

Originally published as Crime editor Mark Morri on why Sydney’s gang war was never really over