7 OCT 2026Bourke Street attack, Melbourne
7 OCT 2026 Surabaya church bombings
On the morning of Sunday 13 May 2018, a family of six carried out suicide bombings at three churches in Surabaya, Indonesia's second-largest city. Police said the father drove a car bomb into the grounds of Surabaya Centre Pentecostal Church. The mother and two daughters, aged 9 and 12, blew themselves up at Diponegoro Indonesian Christian Church. The two sons, aged 16 and 18, rode motorcycles into Santa Maria Catholic Church. Officials said at least 13 people were killed and about 40 were wounded.
National police chief Tito Karnavian said the family belonged to Jemaah Ansharut Daulah (JAD), a network inspired by Islamic State, and Islamic State claimed the attacks through its Amaq news agency. Police named the father as Dita Oepriarto and said he led a local JAD cell. President Joko Widodo called the attacks "barbaric". Police first said the family had returned from Syria, but Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull later said publicly that the father "had not come back from Syria". Sources disagree on this point.
On 13 May 2018 Foreign Minister Julie Bishop's office issued a statement saying "The Australian Government condemns the cowardly terrorist attacks this morning at three Christian churches in the Indonesian city of Surabaya". It also said "We stand in solidarity with the Government of Indonesia against this barbaric attack on peaceful religious gatherings." Speaking to the Seven Network on 15 May (AEST), Bishop said the use of children "takes it to a whole new horrifying level". Turnbull described it as "sickeningly cruel" (AAP via SBS).
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7 OCT 2026 Strasbourg Christmas market attack
At about 8pm local time on 11 December 2018, a gunman attacked people with a gun and a knife in the streets around place Kléber in central Strasbourg, near the city's Christmas market. Prosecutor Rémy Heitz said the attacker shouted "Allahu Akbar" during the attack. He exchanged fire with soldiers from Operation Sentinelle, was wounded in the arm and escaped in a taxi.
Five people died: Anupong Suebsamarn, a Thai tourist; Kamal Naghchband, a garage mechanic originally from Afghanistan; Italian journalist Antonio Megalizzi; Polish national Barto Pedro Orent-Niedzielski; and a 61-year-old retired bank worker from Strasbourg. Eleven others were injured (BBC).
The suspect was Cherif Chekatt, 29, who was born in Strasbourg. He had 27 criminal convictions across France, Germany and Switzerland and was on France's "fiche S" security watchlist. On the evening of 13 December, police found him in the Neudorf district, where he fired at officers and was shot dead. Judicial sources told AFP that a video found on his USB key showed him pledging allegiance to Islamic State, and IS claimed him as one of its "soldiers", although Interior Minister Christophe Castaner cast doubt on that claim.
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Introduction
On 9 November 2018, Hassan Khalif Shire Ali parked a ute loaded with gas cylinders in Bourke Street, in the centre of Melbourne, and opened the cylinders. After the ute caught fire, he attacked people with a knife.
He stabbed three men. Sisto Malaspina, co-owner of Pellegrini's Espresso Bar, was killed, and the other two men were injured.
A bystander, Michael Rogers, picked up a shopping trolley and ran it at Shire Ali. "I threw the trolley straight at him, and I got him. I didn't quite get him down, though. I'm no hero," he said. Victoria Police Chief Commissioner Graham Ashton said he had "attempted to support the police there, and do what he could".
Police arrived and other bystanders became involved, and the attack was filmed from multiple angles. Police shot Shire Ali during the confrontation, and he later died.
Government Response
Authorities treated the incident as a terrorist attack. Shire Ali was known to security agencies: his passport had been cancelled in 2015 after ASIO assessed that he planned to travel to Syria, but he was not assessed as a threat to national security.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison said he supported religious freedom, but not "radical, violent, extremist Islam", and said Islamic religious leaders had a special responsibility to root out dangerous teachings (SBS). Some Muslim leaders then boycotted a meeting with him, saying ministers' statements implied "the community is collectively culpable for the criminal actions of individuals" (SBS).
Morrison dismissed suggestions that the attacker's mental health explained the attack, calling it an "excuse" and blaming Islamic State radicalisation (ABC). The Australian National Imams Council said it was "outraged" by his comments linking Islam to a radical and dangerous ideology (SBS). At the inquest, Shire Ali's wife said he had been having "hallucinations" and sweeping their home and car for listening devices before the attack (ABC).
His brother, Ali Khalif Shire Ali, had been arrested in November 2017 over a planned New Year's Eve attack in Melbourne. He pleaded guilty and, on appeal, his sentence was increased to 16 years.
In June 2021 the Victorian State Coroner, John Cain, found the attack was an act of terrorism motivated by Shire Ali's adherence to Islamist extremism and Islamic State. He found that opportunities to prevent it "may have been missed" by Victoria Police's Security Intelligence Unit.
The coroner found the unit's decision to manage him as a low-risk threat was "premature", and that it mistakenly believed it should only passively monitor him at ASIO's request. He also said he was "unable to conclude" that Shire Ali's path to the attack would have been averted had the gaps been filled, as the ABC reported. The coroner said he could not rule out that Shire Ali was suffering from mental illness at the time, because there was not enough evidence.
Summary
On 9 November 2018, Hassan Khalif Shire Ali set a ute of gas cylinders alight in Bourke Street and stabbed three men. Sisto Malaspina, a well-known Melbourne restaurateur, was killed. A bystander, Michael Rogers, threw a shopping trolley at him. Police shot Shire Ali, and he died.
The street had seen an unrelated vehicle attack in January 2017. Footage of bystanders confronting the attacker became part of the public record.
In 2021 the coroner found it was an act of terrorism motivated by Islamist extremism and Islamic State, that opportunities to prevent it "may have been missed", and that he was "unable to conclude" the attack would have been averted.
You be the judge.
