Iran has rejected allegations it was behind two antisemitic arson attacks in Australia, and vowed “reciprocal action” against Australia for expelling its ambassador.
A car carrying embassy officials was seen leaving the Iranian embassy in Canberra on Tuesday night. Iran’s ambassador – now persona non grata – and other diplomats have been given seven days to leave the country.
The Iranian foreign minister called the Australian prime minister a “weak politician” and said Australia’s actions – which included proscribing the powerful Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps as a terrorist organisation – were an attempt to appease Israel.
On Tuesday, the prime minister, Anthony Albanese, said his government had “credible intelligence” the Iranian government had directed at least two arson attacks in Australia last year, on the Adass Israel synagogue in Melbourne and Lewis’s Continental Kitchen in Bondi in Sydney. It was “likely”, Albanese said, that Iran was responsible for other antisemitic attacks.
Legislation to designate the IRGC as a terror group is likely to take some time, potentially weeks, to be finalised. Home affairs minister Tony Burke told Sky News the legislation was being drafted, with hopes to make the change “as soon as we can.”
“It’s a process which is not possible with the current legislation,” he said.
Asked on Wednesday about the accusation that Australia had acted to appease Israel, the foreign affairs minister Penny Wong said “we act in Australia’s interests”.
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The Australian government believes the arson attacks were engineered by commanders in the IRGC, who, through a series of intermediaries targeted the synagogue and the kosher deli, in heavily Jewish neighbourhoods in Australia’s two largest cities.
“These were extraordinary and dangerous acts of aggression orchestrated by a foreign nation on Australian soil,” Albanese said.
“They were attempts to undermine social cohesion and sow discord in our community. It is totally unacceptable.”
Australian diplomats were withdrawn from Tehran ahead of the announcement.
Iran’s foreign minister, Seyed Abbas Araghchi, said that for Iran to attack Australia’s Jewish community “makes zero sense”
“I am not in the habit of joining causes with wanted war criminals, but Netanyahu is right about one thing: Australia’s PM is indeed a ‘weak politician’,” Araghchi said online.
“Iran is paying the price for the Australian people’s support for Palestine. Canberra should know better than to attempt to appease a regime led by war criminals. Doing so will only embolden Netanyahu and his ilk.”
Foreign ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baqaei denied Iran was behind the attacks.
“The accusation that has been made is absolutely rejected,” he said. “Any inappropriate and unjustified action on a diplomatic level will have a reciprocal reaction.
Asked exactly what evidence Asio presented to make the assessment that Iran had directed the attacks, Wong declined to say in a press conference, but said the government had confidence in its security agencies.
“We have confidence in Asio assessments. We have confidence in our security agencies, and we have acted on it, on their assessments,” she said.
Asked why Australia was targeted in this way, Wong said Iran had engaged in foreign interference around the world.
“What is different about this... is this is orchestration of a violent attack. Obviously, we will continue to investigate the these sorts of issues, the reasons behind as well as the other lines of inquiry,” she said.
“But I would make this point, this is unacceptable. We have diplomatic relations with countries with whom we don’t agree. We do that for our interests, but to have a foreign country organise a violent action on Australian soil crosses a line.”
Wong said she believed there were between 2000 and 4000 Australians currently in Iran. On Channel Nine, asked about Iran’s denials, Wong said the government “is not going to countenance a foreign regime engaging in activities in Australia which are not just about sowing division, they are that. But they are also violent acts which harm or have the potential to harm Australians.”
Australian federal police and the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (Asio) have been investigating possible foreign orchestration of the arson attacks for months.
As long ago as January, the AFP commissioner, Reece Kershaw, issued a statement, saying “we are looking into whether overseas actors or individuals have paid local criminals in Australia to carry out some of these crimes”.
But the announcement of the expulsion of the ambassador and proscribing of the IRGC comes as Australia’s relations with Israel reached a nadir over Canberra’s criticism of the worsening human-made famine in Gaza and the IDF’s prosecution of its war in the occupied territory.
The Australian Iranian Community Alliance welcomed the Australian government’s move against Iran, saying the regime had built “adversarial networks” across Australia “to undermine social cohesion, instil fear, and conduct attacks”.
“Let us be clear: this is not a diplomatic disagreement with a sovereign nation. This is a countermeasure against a transnational criminal enterprise that has hijacked a country, plundered its resources, destabilised a region, and targeted innocent lives globally – including here in Australia.”
The IRGC has been proscribed as a terrorist organisation by the US, Canada, Sweden, Bahrain and Saudi Arabia, among others.
with Agence France Presse
