Radical Islamists ‘fishing’ in teen programs
Millions of dollars are being wasted on taxpayer-funded ‘deradicalisation’ programs which in some cases connect children with radical recruiters.
Frustrated youth workers have warned that millions of dollars are being wasted on taxpayer-funded “deradicalisation” programs that either achieve nothing or, in some cases, actually connect at-risk children with radical recruiters.
Sarkis Achmar, who has dedicated much of his life to working with troubled teens in Sydney’s west, said the initiatives were deeply flawed and were routinely infiltrated by members of Islamic extremist gangs posing as either volunteers or participants.
The 57-year-old said many of the programs’ activities — such a public barbecues designed to foster a greater sense of community inclusion among disaffected teenagers — had become prime targets for unscrupulous recruiters looking to sway young minds.
While their tactics had been largely curbed by the health restrictions introduced to combat COVID-19, he feared there would be a renewed recruitment push by radicals as the nation opened back up. “These guys, they’re predators. They’re exactly like the pedophiles, and the bikies, and the drug dealers — they’re on that level,” Mr Achmar said.
“So when you get a whole heap of young people who are at risk and you’re bringing them together for intervention programs and community barbecues, what you’re doing is telling these predators where to find them. You’re doing them a favour and then it’s like shooting fish in a barrel.
“What they do is, the senior recruiters, they send young Arab guys into these outreach activities to mingle with the other young people and make out like they are volunteers and that they’re somehow part of the service.
“All they’re really doing is fishing out the most vulnerable kids. That’s when the older guys come down and start indoctrinating them and preaching to them. It’s incredibly difficult to police.
“Instead of shutting them out, deradicalisation programs are opening new pathways for these guys and inviting them back in. They’re using the system against itself and we’re losing a lot of young kids to them.”
A second-generation Lebanese-Australian born and raised in Bankstown, Mr Achmar has spent two decades engaging with the suburb’s most at-risk teens.
While many deradicalisation programs were well intentioned, he said, they focused far too heavily on religious education and community inclusion rather than tackling the issues that played the strongest role in pushing alienated teenagers to the radical fringes, such as education and employment opportunities.
Even when delicate matters revolving around religion needed to be addressed, Mr Achmar said, the programs failed the youths they were designed to protect.
He said extremist sentiments in vulnerable communities had been stoked by the Christchurch massacre, in which right-wing Australian terrorist Brenton Tarrant murdered 51 Muslims in two mosques during Friday prayer sessions last year. However, many program leaders were reticent to call out radical recruiters using the attack to foment hate because they feared being labelled racists.
“These recruiters are using what happened in Christchurch to make these young kids feel like the whole f. king world is against them, and that all white people hate Muslims,” Mr Achmar said.
“No one wants to say anything because they don’t want to offend anyone. All these do-gooder lefties, who have never worked on the street and have no idea what’s really going on, are coming out and screaming: ‘Oh those poor things, we shouldn’t discriminate because they are Muslim.’
“What the f. k are they talking about? These recruiters aren’t good Muslims, they’re criminals using the guise of their religion to lure kids into their gangs. This extremism is not an Islamic problem, it’s a criminal problem, and we shouldn’t be worried about offending criminals.”
In NSW, where Mr Achmar operates, more than $50m has been spent on deradicalisation programs since 2015.
NSW Police Minister David Elliot, who also grew up in Bankstown in Sydney’s west, said he had questioned the impact deradicalisation programs were having but that it was too early for a final assessment of their benefits.
“I’m going to get myself in trouble and say the jury’s still out (on these initiatives),” Mr Elliott said. “That’s not to say that we stop putting energy into it. Just because we haven’t had immediate evidence of success doesn’t mean we walk away from it.
“There’s no doubt in my mind that recruiters are still actively targeting at-risk children and there’s no doubt in my mind it is for evil purposes. You only need to see the assassination of (police accountant) Curtis Cheng by a radicalised 15-year-old in Parramatta (in 2015) as an example of that.”
Multicultural NSW, the government body that oversees the state’s deradicalisation initiatives, said that all youth workers followed strict protocols and immediately told the authorities if they had reason to believe any services or activities were being targeted by extremist recruiters.
