A 16-year-old boy has been charged with a “terrorist act” for stabbing a bishop during a live-streamed sermon at a church near Sydney, Australia, police said Friday.
Mar Mari Emmanuel, a bishop of an Assyrian church, was stabbed six times in the head and chest on Monday evening at the Church of Christ the Good Shepherd in Wakeley, a suburb of Sydney. He was hospitalized without his life being in danger. This bishop said “forgive the one who committed this act” in a video posted on YouTube.
According to police, the attacker traveled 90 minutes to Wekeley, a neighborhood known for welcoming members of the small Assyrian Christian community who fled persecution and war in Iraq and Syria.
Questioned by the police
The suspect, who was overpowered by the faithful and injured in the scuffle, was hospitalized after his arrest. He is due to be heard this Friday in a children's court from his bed, said Karen Webb, commissioner of the New South Wales state police.
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The Sydney Joint Counter-Terrorism Team, made up of several police and intelligence agencies, charged him with "committing an act of terrorism", based on the contents of electronic devices found at his home and an interview at the hospital, she added.
He was denied bail and could face life in prison if convicted. Police did not specify what ideology motivated the attacker.
Two knife attacks
The bishop, whose sermons broadcast on the Internet are widely followed, gained his notoriety by criticizing vaccines against Covid-19 and confinements during the pandemic, and by defending the primacy of his faith over other religions, including Islam.
Australia suffered two knife attacks in a matter of days. On April 13, a man fatally stabbed six people in a shopping center. The terrorist nature of the attack was not recognized at this stage by the police. Australian police identified the perpetrator as a 40-year-old man suffering from mental illness. A Frenchman, Damien Guerot, was offered Australian citizenship after fighting off an attacker with a pole.