Australia's national terrorism threat level is being lifted to "probable" for the first time since 2022, amid rising radical political and religious tensions and several recent attempted local attacks. ASIO says there is no specific intelligence pointing to an imminent attack but has cited the war in Gaza as a contributing factor.
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TVTranscript
00:00This is a significant announcement, and as you say, Australia's terror alert level has
00:07been at possible since November 2022, when the government lowered it from probable. It
00:16had been at probable for eight years prior, and that was at the beginning of the war against
00:22Islamic State. Authorities back in 2014 had lifted Australia's national terror alert
00:29level to probable. Today, confirmation that it is going back to that level, but as we
00:35say, there is no specific threat that's been identified, but rather authorities are pointing
00:42to a general rising of the temperature in terms of radical ideology and radical movements
00:50within society. A particular area that has been pointed to is social media, and also
00:57young men particularly. They have been identified as being involved in eight attempted terror
01:04attacks on Australian soil since April. But let's hear from the Prime Minister, Anthony
01:10Albanese, who was announcing this significant step after the meeting of Cabinet's National
01:17Security Committee. I want to reassure Australians. Probable does not mean inevitable, and it
01:25does not mean there is intelligence about an imminent threat or danger. But the advice
01:31that we've received is that more Australians are embracing a more diverse range of extreme
01:36ideologies, and it is our responsibility to be vigilant. That was the Prime Minister,
01:45Anthony Albanese, speaking alongside ASIO's Director-General, Mike Burgess, and the Attorney-General,
01:51Mark Dreyfuss. For some time, ASIO has been talking about foreign interference and espionage
01:59being the greatest threat facing this country in a security sense, and we saw that really
02:06overtake terrorism at the same time the terror threat level was reduced. Now that it has
02:12gone back to probable, the country's domestic intelligence chief is saying that terrorism
02:20now is back to being the greatest threat that his agency is dealing with. It's overtaken
02:26espionage and foreign interference. Let's hear from Mike Burgess as he was speaking
02:31today alongside the Prime Minister. Gaza is not the cause of this rising, but actually
02:36I acknowledge, yes, it's a significant driver. It's driven more emotion and heat into society.
02:43ASIO's job is not to look at people who protest lawful dissent, lawful protest are fine. It's
02:47for people who think violence is the answer. Not just because of Gaza, though, in this
02:52current environment, violence is more likely at protests. Andrew, tell us, what's been
02:56the reaction to this announcement? Well, so far there has been no reaction from the Greens
03:02political party. They were singled out by the Prime Minister for some of the language
03:08to do with the Gaza conflict. Labor is pushing back quite strongly against suggestions from
03:14the Greens that the Australian government is somehow supporting a genocide in Gaza.
03:21The Prime Minister says that is absolutely not the case and that what is happening in
03:26the Middle East has very little to do with Australia or the Australian government. But
03:31separately, the opposition leader has spoken about the lifting of the terror threat level.
03:37He's been very critical of the decision by authorities not to take a hard-aligned stance
03:42against anti-Israel protesters, particularly shortly after the October 7 terror attacks
03:49when we saw protests around the Sydney Opera House. But in any case, Peter Dutton was sounding
03:55supportive. Let's hear from him. I just encourage people please to heed the advice from Mike
04:00Burgess because we do live in a precarious time. The national security risks that we
04:07have because of our values and what we believe in will always be there and we need to make
04:12sure that every support is provided to ASIO and I'll make sure that we do that.
04:18That was the opposition leader, Peter Dutton, speaking in Western Australia, as I say, supportive
04:24of this decision to lift the official terror alert level from possible to probable, somewhere
04:30it hasn't been since November 2022. And of course, the last time that it was lifted to
04:37this level was back in 2014.