Australia is a ‘likely target’ for an ISIL attack: Defence professor

Involvement in the war against ISIS and a localised Muslim community means Australia is a “likely target” for a terror attack from the jihadist militant group.

Carl Thayer, an Australian Defence Force Academy professor, told Bloomberg TV that Bali was the target of an al-Qaeda bombing in 2002 because of Australian and American tourists there.

Today, Thayer said, ISIS are more likely to directly target foreign countries, such as Australia.

“Australia is probably a likely target because Australia is involved [in the fight against ISIS], it has a Muslim community, and the security forces here [in Australia] have been relatively successful in rounding up plots as they have emerged, but [the] Paris [attacks] could inspired others to follow through,” Thayer said.

“It depends on how slick ISIS’ propaganda [is] in encouraging others to take individual actions [and] make contact with ISIS handlers who would direct them in certain attacks.”

Thayer said ISIS is changing its attack strategy to target “broad-based civilians” and tourists.

“The more recent security alerts prior to Paris were that ISIS was targeting un-uniformed military police and intelligence officials.

“But this attack in Paris says the general public are now at risk across Asia where foreign tourists gather from countries which are involved in suppressing ISIS.

“So there could be problems,” Thayer added.