Details have come to light of the radical beliefs and a possible trip to an extremist hotspot by the father and son responsible for Australia's deadliest mass murder in three decades.
Sajid Akram, 50, and his son Naveed Akram, 24, fired toward a Jewish gathering at Bondi Beach on Sunday, killing at least 15 people and wounding dozens more.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said the duo were influenced by an "extreme perversion of Islam", but there was no evidence they were part of a larger cell.
"It would appear that this was motivated by Islamic State ideology," he told ABC radio on Tuesday.
Naveed came to the attention of Australia's intelligence agency Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO) in 2019, when he was interviewed due to his association with two people, who were subsequently imprisoned.
"What ASIO do is they go through and interview anyone who is connected in any way, and they go through, including family members and others," Albanese said.
"They determined that there was no evidence of this person planning or considering or indeed promoting any act of violence, or any act which could be deemed to be anti-Semitic, targeting the Jewish community, which is what occurred.
"That investigation went for six months and that is a determination that they made."
When and how he was radicalised after that was under investigation, the prime minister said.
An Islamic State flag is believed to have been found at the scene and the pair had reportedly travelled to the Philippines, a known hotspot for the Islamic State of East Asia, weeks before the attack.
The branch is a designated terrorist organisation in Australia.
Attack on Jewish community celebrating Hanukkah is the worst Australian mass killing since Port Arthur in 1996. (Source: 1News)
Naveed is an Australian-born citizen while Sajid arrived in Australia in 1998 on a student visa before transferring to a partner visa in 2001.
Sajid travelled out of Australia three times and returned on resident visas, Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke said.
The father owned six firearms legally, four of which were found at the scene and two were recovered from a house in Campsie, in Sydney's southwest, which the pair used as a short-term rental ahead of the attack.
Police have raided the Campsie rental and their home in Bonnyrigg.
Sajid was fatally shot during the massacre at Bondi, while Naveed remains in a coma in hospital.
The 24-year-old underwent an operation on Monday and is under close police guard.
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