Bondi attack shows marginalisation isn’t driving ISIS. Extremism must be stopped from within

Without falling into a cycle of hatred, we can name what we are confronting — the ideological framework of ISIS for which the world is divided into believers and non-believers.

Representative image of Bondi beach | commons

The recent attack at Bondi Beach in Australia will further heighten fear within the Jewish community and reinforce the sense of rising antisemitism. The mass shooting during the Hanukkah festival, which left 15 people dead and more than 40 injured, shattered a collective sense of security in a country that prides itself on safety and social cohesion. Australia’s strict gun control laws are often held up as a model, yet this tragedy shows that legislation alone cannot shield societies from the menace of extremist hatred.

While condemnation poured in from every corner of the world, one moment stood out. Sydney’s Muslim community refused to perform funeral rites for the Bondi massacre attacker. Dr Jamal Rifi, a respected voice within the community, stated clearly: “What they have done is not condoned by any of us. Killing innocent civilians is condemned—our scripture teaches that killing one innocent life is like killing all of humanity.”

And yet, in the heat of collective shock and rage, hatred continued to spill over on social media, directed not at the crime or the shooters but the entire Muslim community. The attack on a Jewish religious gathering is just another example of terrorism targeting faith, memory, and identity to spread fear, while simultaneously attempting to erase the very idea of coexistence. Such acts must be rejected without hesitation as they are deliberate attempts to fracture societies along religious and cultural lines. But if we allow that fracture to widen by responding with hate against another community, then we are letting terror succeed.

What makes the Bondi attack even more dangerous are reports suggesting that one of the suspects openly declared support for the Islamic State. That detail cannot be brushed aside. While refusing to fall into a cycle of hatred is essential, because that is exactly what ideologically driven terror groups want, it is equally important to understand what we are confronting, and why it exists in the first place.

The Islamic State’s core belief is un-Islamic 

ISIS does not simply emerge from anger or alienation; it is rooted in a specific ideological framework. It draws from Salafism, a conservative school of Islamic thought that seeks to imitate the practices of early Muslims, but it is not exactly similar to mainstream Salafism. ISIS represents an apocalyptic, takfiri (practice of declaring other Muslims unbelievers in order to justify killing them), and a deeply totalitarian project, demanding obedience and control. In the process, it strips Islam of its moral and spiritual core, replacing it with a hollow belief system designed to justify endless violence. Its goal is not justice, reform, or faith, but absolute control through fear. If we fail to name this distortion, we leave space for both blind hatred and dangerous denial—and neither protects society, nor the communities these groups ultimately destroy.

At the heart of jihadist ideology lies a dangerous shift: the claim that violent jihad is an individual obligation—fard ‘ayn—for every believer, rather than something bound by strict conditions, ethics, and collective authority. ISIS takes such distortion to its most extreme end. It doesn’t just argue for violence; it weaponises belief itself. By declaring almost everyone outside its narrow worldview an apostate, it turns disagreement into a crime punishable by death. Centuries of Islamic scholarship, debate, restraint, and moral caution are discarded as irrelevant. This is why many serious scholars refuse to call ISIS “ultra-orthodox” but extremist and heretical. What it practices is reckless reduction of faith—an ideology stripped of nuance and humanity.

The real engine driving ISIS is takfir, the act of excommunicating others from Islam. Through takfir, ISIS declares Shia Muslims, Sufis, most Sunnis, secular Muslims, political leaders, religious scholars, and even rival militant groups as apostates. Once someone is labelled un-Islamic, their life becomes disposable. Mass killings, enslavement, and ethnic cleansing—all become justifiable through this single ideological move. This is an uncomfortable truth many avoid: ISIS does not primarily wage war against the West. Its main victims have always been Muslims who refuse to submit to its authority. That is what makes it fundamentally different from earlier militant movements—and far more corrosive. It is not fighting for Islam; it is fighting to erase every version of Islam except its own.

As Olivier Roy rightly observes, ISIS seeks purity through destruction, not gradual political change. ISIS is also deeply millenarian. It believes the world is already in its final chapter, that the end times are unfolding, and that a decisive battle between believers and non-believers is imminent. The group rejects the very idea of the modern world. It sees democracy as shirk, national borders as illegitimate, and citizenship or constitutional law as corrupt inventions. In its place, ISIS demands absolute obedience to a self-declared Caliph, where religion, law, violence, and governance collapse into a single totalitarian force. Control over women is also a cornerstone of ISIS ideology. Women’s bodies, movement, education, and reproduction are tightly regulated. Masculinity is defined through violence, martyrdom, and absolute control.

And this is what unsettles me the most. The people who carry out such terror attacks are not always the poorest, the most marginalised, or the most desperate. Many are educated, articulate, and fully aware of their actions. They believe deeply in a vision of society they consider pure and perfect: a utopian caliphate ruled by what they call divine law. They know that suffering will come, that they themselves may suffer or die. Yet, they commit these heinous acts willingly, convinced that violence will accelerate what they see as inevitable. In their minds, the world must first be divided into believers and non-believers so that a final, cleansing battle can take place. Terror, for them, is a tool, and death is part of the plan.

What makes this even more unsettling is that one of the terror suspects in the Bondi Beach attack is of Indian origin. It is difficult not to feel a deep worry if someone from our own community can be radicalised to such an extreme; what’s to stop these ideas from seeping back home? It is a chilling reminder that the fight against radicalisation cannot be left solely to the governments. The Muslim community itself must be at the forefront, actively working to prevent the seeds of extremism from taking root.

Amana Begam Ansari is a columnist and writer. She runs a weekly YouTube show called ‘India This Week by Amana and Khalid’. She tweets @Amana_Ansari. Views are personal.

(Edited by Ratan Priya)