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'Generation Jihad' in Australia is homegrown: Report

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ANI Sydney

Australian suburbs like Bankstown, which are surrounded by family homes, are in danger of being turned into ghettos by young men who are usually born in Australia to Lebanese parents and are cannon fodder for hardline Muslim preachers.

These young men are part of generation jihad.

A recent two-year federal parliamentary inquiry into multiculturalism was swamped by concerns about the rising influence of Islam in Australia and fears that organisations such as Hizb ut-Tahrir and conservative imams were "promoting the radicalisation of second-generation Muslim youth and voluntary social exclusion", reports News.com.au.

The report, released in March, said this was thought to support the formation of Muslim-only enclaves, leading to long-term problems such as unemployment.

 

Organisations keep popping up to attract young acolytes. Like the radical political Islamic group Hizb ut-Tahrir, Sheik Feiz Mohammed, the Global Islamic Youth Centre at Liverpool, Auburn's Bukhari House Bookshop and prayer hall, of which Feiz Mohammed is a director.

So far intelligence agencies have stayed one step ahead of the terrorism threat.

Milad bin Ahmad-Shah al-Ahmadzai, 23, has been under surveillance by counter-terrorism police since he was 19 and this week was arrested for allegedly threatening to "slit the throat" of an officer, a court heard on Tuesday.

Al-Ahmadzai, Sydney born and bred although he has identified himself as "ethnic Pashtun from Afghanistan", has also previously been pinpointed as a threat to soldiers on Australian soil.

ASIO director-general David Irvine has warned of a dramatic increase in the number of young ethnic men travelling to take part in the Syrian war.

Community leader Dr Jamal Rifi said when they come back they are radicalized, and look on people with a high moral ground.

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First Published: May 30 2013 | 4:41 PM IST

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