Influential alleged former IS member Wassim Fayad raided in Sydney counter-terror blitz

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An influential former Islamic State supporter who was released from a supervision order last year was questioned in Wednesday's police raids on an alleged terrorism network involving a group of Sydney boys.

Excerpts from a police warrant seen by ABC Investigations show self-styled preacher Wassim Fayad, 56, was among two men and 12 boys targeted in the raids across south-west Sydney, as part of an investigation triggered by the stabbing of a bishop last week.

Five boys, aged 14 to 17, faced a children's court on Thursday charged with a range of offences, including conspiring to prepare or plan for a terrorist act.

Fayad spent seven years in jail until 2020 after being convicted of a failed ATM ram raid, the whipping of a Muslim convert and being an accessory to an attempted shooting murder at a gay sex club.

While in jail, police alleged Fayad was a member of an Islamic State terrorism cell that was plotting attacks in Sydney.

Once released, the Supreme Court placed him on a two-year extended supervision order in 2021, finding he was a high risk of recruiting younger or vulnerable people to commit a terrorism offence.

But a judge last year refused to extend that order, ruling the state of NSW had not proved he posed "an unacceptable risk of committing a serious terrorism offence if not kept under supervision".

On Wednesday, about 400 officers from the Joint Counter-Terrorism Team (JCTT) — which includes NSW Police, Australian Federal Police, the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO) and the NSW Crime Commission - raided 13 addresses across Sydney.

Seven teenage boys were arrested, but two of them have so far not been charged.

Police questioned another five boys and two men, including Fayad, who have not been charged.

Police have arrested seven boys aged between 14 and 17 as part of their investigation.(Supplied: NSW Police)

The investigation was sparked by the stabbing of conservative Assyrian Orthodox Bishop Mar Mari Emmanuel during a live-streamed church service at a church in Wakeley in south-west Sydney last week, over which a 16-year-old boy was charged.

AFP Deputy Commissioner Krissy Barrett on Wednesday said surveillance of the group uncovered "a network of associates and peers who … share a similar violent extremist ideology" with the alleged Wakeley attacker.

The police warrant shows several of the teenagers were part of a WhatsApp group, called 'Brotherhood', which included the 16-year-old boy accused of the attack at the Christ the Good Shepherd Church.

A senior law enforcement source told ABC Investigations there was no evidence of planning for a specific attack, but communications between the group suggested the early stages of preparations.

The source said the JCTT decided to pounce on Wednesday because of fears the boys could be "highly volatile".

Fayad claimed whipping was inspired by Sharia law

Wassim Fayad — formerly known as Fadi Alameddine or Abu Zakariyah — has been a notorious figure in Australia's small extremist scene for more than 15 years, both in and outside jail.

In 2011, he and a group of younger men whipped a Muslim convert 40 times with an electrical cable in a punishment for drinking alcohol and taking drugs, inspired by his twisted interpretation of Sharia law.

While on bail for that offence in 2013, he and two other men used stolen vans in a failed ram raid on a shopping centre ATM, with the intention of sending money to Syria.

He was also convicted of being an accessory to the 2013 shooting of a man in the car park of a Sydney sex club, after advising a suspect to flee the country.

Wassim Fayad claimed the whipping of a Muslim convert was inspired by Sharia law.(ABC News, file photo)

While in prison, Fayad was moved to the maximum-security Supermax prison in Goulburn after young members of an Islamic State cell were discovered to be visiting him in jail in 2014 and 2015.

Several went on to commit terrorism offences, including involvement in the fatal shooting of police accountant Curtis Cheng at the NSW Police headquarters in 2015.

A court heard Fayad also allegedly helped recruit young Sydney men to travel to Syria in 2013 to fight for proscribed organisations, but he was not charged with any related offence.

Fayad had 'pathological preoccupation with idiosyncratic Islam', psychiatric report said

After his release from jail, the Supreme Court found he was a high risk of committing a serious terrorism offence and placed him on a two-year extended supervision order in 2021.

Among the 51 conditions of the order, he was required to wear an electronic monitoring device and prevented from possessing weapons or associating with specified people.

The court heard evidence from mental health professionals that Fayad was at risk of indoctrinating, radicalising and encouraging others to participate in terrorism, given his high level of influence among peers.

A 2021 psychological report prepared for the court said Fayad was also likely to support and help organise a terrorist act "in conjunction with his strong and significant network of others who support an extremist ideology".

Fayad had a "tendency to deception" and "fixation or pathological preoccupation with idiosyncratic Islam and related doctrine", according to a separate psychiatric report provided to the court.

"He frames his life by ideology and this ideology likely justifies violence," the report said.

"He also derives satisfaction from influencing others, and his associations with persons engaged and interested in violent extremism could involve him in recruiting, fundraising and general support of terrorism, which are more likely than personally engaging in terrorist violence in his case."

Bishop Mar Mari Emmanuel was attacked while conducting a service at the Assyrian Orthodox Christ The Good Shepherd Church in Sydney's west on April 15.(ABC News: Supplied: YouTube)

But in rejecting an application to extend his supervision order in February 2023, Supreme Court judge Deborah Sweeney ruled "the evidence does not support the assertion that Mr Fayad is part of an extensive network of individuals who may have the capacity to plan and execute extremist acts".

"Taking the evidence at its highest it shows that Mr Fayad has known, or knows and has had past contact with, people who have committed terrorist offences … after they had visited Mr Fayad in custody," Justice Sweeney said.

"Care must be taken to not confuse his support for his religious beliefs with support for terrorism."

Fayad had refused to be interviewed for a new psychiatric risk assessment report which was prepared in 2022 for the state of NSW's Supreme Court application.

That report reduced his risk of engaging in violent extremism from high to moderate.

But it noted he remained "highly influential" and was likely to "return to associate with people who had been identified as 'high risk'".

"In the context of these unhelpful associations Mr Fayad's ideology may become increasingly radicalised and his overall risk profile may escalate rapidly," the report said.

The Assyrian Orthodox Christ The Good Shepherd Church in Wakeley, where bishop Mar Mari Emmanuel was attacked on April 15.(ABC News: Ethan Rix)

Fayad's legal team last year argued there was no evidence he supported any terrorist organisation at the time and that his views about Islamic State had changed.

His lawyers said he had been assessed as having a low range of cognitive ability, limited vocabulary and difficulty engaging in hypothetical abstract reasoning.

Fayad was not charged in Wednesday's raids but remains under investigation.

Overnight, two boys, aged 17 and 14, were charged with "possessing or controlling violent extremist material obtained or accessed using a carriage service".

Three boys, aged 16 and 17, were charged with "conspiring to engage in any act in preparation for, or planning, a terrorist act".

The 17-year-old was also charged with carrying a knife in a public place.