Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) directed two arson attacks against Jewish targets in Australia through agents with direct ties to the country, the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO) director-general said Wednesday.
ASIO Director-General Mike Burgess said one agent, an Australian citizen living in Iran, held a senior position within the IRGC’s Quds Force, the covert unit responsible for cultivating and directing proxy networks abroad.
That individual orchestrated the October 2024 firebombing of Lewis’ Continental Kitchen, a kosher eatery in Sydney’s Bondi. A second agent, a former Australian resident living in Iraq, directed the December 2024 arson at the Adass Israel Synagogue in Melbourne after being recruited through Iraqi-based militia groups.
The Melbourne-linked operative was later imprisoned. “This person’s Iranian backers lost their enthusiasm, and after further pressure from Australian and local law enforcement, they threw him in prison,” Burgess said.
Iran has denied involvement in the attacks. Australia expelled Tehran’s ambassador in August 2025 following ASIO’s initial attribution of both arsons to the IRGC.
Burgess warned that an Iranian group active in Europe now poses an assassination risk on Australian soil. “Iran continues to view Australia as a legitimate target for covertly directed acts of violence,” he said.
The assessment was Burgess’s first since the December 2025 Bondi Beach shooting, which killed 15 people. ASIO has resolved 14 significant terror-related cases since the attack, and counter-terrorism staffing in 2025 stood at nearly double 2005 levels.
Australia’s terror threat remains at “probable,” but Burgess said the label understates current conditions. “With the temperature turned up, the threat is more likely than ‘probable’ would suggest,” he said.
Separately, Burgess disclosed a foreign attempt to acquire classified information on the AUKUS nuclear-powered submarine program through a fabricated consulting arrangement targeting a cleared Australian official.
