’Let Australia burn’

Frightening ISIS video tells terrorists to attack West with fire

POTENTIAL jihadi terrorists are being urged to attack Australia and the West using arson and deliberately-lit bushfires, in the latest shocking ISIS recruitment video.

Titled “Incite the Believers”, the new video cites the numbers of people killed in Victorian fires and the tens of thousands of hectares of land burnt out in Australia’s devastating bushfires as incentive for creative new attacks.

The video narration encourages believers, to use “the weapon that is within reach of every hand – at which even children are proficient and people have used since ancient times to harm their enemies – … fire” and to “instil fear in their chests”.

Professor Robert Pape, Director of the University of Chicago Project on Security and Threats, said the video, which he had studied, promotes the use of wild/bushfires because they can kill more people than bombings or other attacks carried out on civilians and are a huge strain on the resources of “disbelieving governments”.

Professor Paper said it was a highly sophisticated and ominous signal of what might be about to occur and governments needed to pay attention.

“The fact that previous alHayat videos calling for action in the West resulted in attacks in the likes of Paris and London suggests this video should be taken seriously as a warning,” he said. “This is really concerning, coming at a time when countries and governments are distracted by the pandemic and civil unrest.”

The slick production was made by the media arm of ISIS known as al-Hayat. It is the first propaganda video from the western-directed media unit in 18 months.

It is being circulated in both Arabic and English language versions and offers practical advice to would-be arsonists to look for dry, isolated areas, dispose of evidence, and beware of law enforcement.