One of the first acts of the gunman who seized a cafe in the heart of Sydney was to force hostages to display a black and white flag bearing the Islamic creed, or Shahada.
To non-Muslims, the flag might immediately evoke Islamic State, Jabhat Al-Nusra, the Khorosan Group, or other violent jihadi groups who have claimed the symbol in recent years.
But according to the UN Alliance of Civilisation global expert on Muslim affairs, Aftab Malik, the stylised creed is a common affirmation of faith.
“It’s merely a statement saying, ‘There is no god but God, and Muhammad is the messenger of God’,” he said.
The symbol reflects one of the five pillars of Islam: an affirmation of the oneness of God and Muhammad’s status as his prophet.
Malik said groups such as Jabhat Al-Nusra draw on the symbolic power of the creed to “claim authority and authenticity before the religiously illiterate masses in a time of great uncertainty and upheaval”.
Its use in this way is not new, either. The ruling al-Saud family put the shahada on Saudi Arabia’s flag to give their nascent country religious legitimacy.
As the Middle East has fragmented, competing militant groups have scrambled to claim the symbol as a way of showing their own Islamic bonafides, and its currency has grown significantly.
Malik said the gunman would have had no trouble getting his hands on the flag he forced the hostages to display, nor does its use suggest any affiliation with a particular group.
“You can purchase it anywhere. It has no politically dominant or ideological meaning. It only has a spiritual meaning,” he said.
