People publicly displaying symbols associated with a state sponsor of terrorism and a radical Islamist group could be imprisoned for two years.
Legislation introduced on Wednesday to NSW parliament expands bans on terrorist symbols to all prohibited organisation symbols, capturing those affiliated with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and recently outlawed hate group Hizb ut-Tahrir.
Waving flags or wearing clothes with their insignia will be punishable with a prison sentence of up two years, a $22,000 fine or both, and $110,000 for corporations.
NSW Attorney-General Michael Daley said the Labor-drafted bill follows in the federal government's footsteps, aimed at holding extremists to account.
"There is no place in NSW for hateful, extremist conduct," he said.
Founded in 1979 after Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini took power in Iran, the IRGC has grown into a feared hybrid military and security apparatus supporting militant groups in the Middle East as well as suppressing local dissent.
Spy agency ASIO said the IRGC directed the firebombings of a Jewish-owned deli Lewis' Continental Kitchen in Sydney in October 2024 and Adass Israel Synagogue in Melbourne in December 2024.
It was listed as a state sponsor of terrorism by the Albanese government in November.
A report published on Thursday by the federal joint committee on intelligence and security found the attacks were fostered through a complex scheme of proxies, in an attempt to conceal IRGC involvement.
They ultimately led to the expulsion of Iran's ambassador from Australia in August.
Iranian diaspora activists also told the committee that family members in their homeland had been threatened after they participated in protests abroad that were reported to IRGC-linked networks.
Earlier in March, the federal government moved legal thresholds outlawing hard-line Islamist group Hizb ut-Tahrir (Freedom Bloc) as a hate group.
It has also been prohibited in several countries including Germany and the United Kingdom as well as Muslim-majority countries such as Egypt, Pakistan and the United Arab Emirates.
The government's ban comes as Iran's top security chief Ali Larijani, who rose through the ranks of the IRGC, was killed by Israel amid a widening conflict in the Middle East.
As part of the clampdown on the display of "divisive and inflammatory symbols", takedown powers will be granted to the police.
Refusal to comply with a takedown order will be punishable by up to three months' imprisonment, a $2200 fine or both.
Days after the December 14 Bondi attack, the NSW government passed laws prohibiting the display of terrorist symbols, mimicking existing federal laws.
The accused father and son perpetrators of the anti-Jewish attack, in which 15 people were killed in December, allegedly had two homemade Islamic State flags in their car.
