Church knife attack was act of terrorism say Australian police

AUSTRALIAN police say a knife attack in Sydney that wounded a bishop and a priest during a church service as horrified worshippers watched online and in person was an act of terrorism.

Police arrested a 16-year-old boy on Tuesday after the stabbing at Christ the Good Shepherd Church that injured bishop Mar Mari Emmanuel and a priest. Both are expected to survive.

New South Wales police commissioner Karen Webb said the suspect’s comments pointed to a religious motive for the attack.

She said: “We’ll allege there’s a degree of premeditation on the basis that this person has travelled to that location, which is not near his residential address, he has travelled with a knife and subsequently the bishop and the priest have been stabbed.

“They’re lucky to be alive.” The teenager was known to police but was not on a terror watch list, Ms Webb said.

Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said the boy was 16, adding that “there is no place for violence in our community”. Previously authorities had said he was 15.

The Christ the Good Shepherd in suburban Wakeley streams sermons online and worshippers watched as a person in black clothes approached the altar and stabbed the bishop and priest Isaac Royel during a church service on Monday evening before the congregation overpowered him, police said.

A crowd of hundreds seeking revenge gathered outside the Orthodox Assyrian church, hurling bricks and bottles, injuring police officers and preventing police from taking the teen outside.

The teen suspect and at least two police officers were also taken to hospital, acting assistant police commissioner Andrew Holland told journalists.

The church said the bishop and priest were in stable condition and asked for people’s prayers.

“It is the bishop’s and father’s wishes that you also pray for the perpetrator,” the statement said.

Mr Holland commended the congregation for subduing the teen before calling police. When asked if the teen’s fingers had been severed, he said the hand injuries were “severe”.

Australians were still in shock after a lone assailant stabbed six people to death in a Sydney shopping centre on Saturday and injured more than a dozen others.