Dear Herbert,
you seem to tar all Muslims with the same brush.

That would be the same as targeting all Christians as supporting pedophilia.

Dear Herbert,
you seem to tar all Muslims with the same brush.

That would be the same as targeting all Christians as supporting pedophilia.

STEVE CANNANE, PRESENTER: This week Federal politics was dominated by terrorism and national security.

To discuss these issues we were joined a short time ago from Hobart by barrister Greg Barnes, he’s a spokesman for the Australian Lawyers Alliance.

And from Canberra by Allan Behm, he’s a strategic analyst, former senior defence official and former chief of staff to Greg Combet.

Greg Barns, Allan Behm, thanks very much for joining us.

ALLAN BEHM, DEFENCE AND SECURITY COMMENTATOR: My Pleasure.

GREG BARNS, BARRISTER: Thank you.

STEVE CANNANE: Greg, you tweeted today, “More uncritical media lapping up every leak from politicians and police about alleged terror activity, exaggeration and spin.” What’s your evidence there’s been exaggeration and spin in relation to these police raids?

GREG BARNS: History is always a good guide to the future and the present Steven, having been involved in the – what’s called the Melbourne terrorism trial in 2008 – where we saw great exaggeration from politicians and police in terms of what they allege was the evidence in that case. It didn’t turn out to be that way.

We saw it again in Muhamed Haneef’s case in the Gold Coast where there was an allegation he was going to blow up a building on the Gold Coast. Again, there was simply no evidence of that.

What we’ve found with anti-terror raids in Australia in the past 10 years or so is that there is a propensity on the part of police and politicians to exaggerate what they allege is the evidence in the case.

And just to give you a very quick example, it was alleged for example, in relation to the Melbourne terrorism trial that iconic Melbourne buildings were at risk of terror attacks. There was simply no evidence led at the trial of those men in 2008 that that was the case.

STEVE CANNANE: That said though, seven of those men went to jail including Benbrika went to jail for 15 years, so there seemed to be a bit of strong evidence that the judge thought?

GREG BARNS: They went to jail because essentially they were deemed to be members of a terrorist organisation but the prosecution conceded that there was no planned attack and that there was no target and no mode of attack but Australia’s anti-terror laws work like this, you can go to jail simply for talking about terrorist activity or for deemed to be a member of a terrorist organisation or supporting a terrorist organisation. You don’t have to have any particular target in mind.

STEVE CANNANE: Allan, is the information coming out in relation to the raids exaggerated, as Greg suggests?

ALLAN BEHM: Look, I don’t think that the information from the police is necessarily exaggerated but I do think the reporting is somewhat over-egged.

A lot is being made of a little, I think.

For example, the issue around the beheading, it started off looking very much like speculation and I think it’s going to be interesting to see when these matters ultimately going to trial exactly how the telephone conversation that apparently sat behind that supposition is actually going to play out.

I don’t know, myself, and I don’t think anybody does, that any of the people who’ve been detained or against whom charges have been laid at this time have actually done anything. They may simply have been on the receiving end of advice, requests or whatever, so I think we’ve just got to be careful at the moment that we don’t start at shadows.

I think what we really need to do is just stay calm and pay attention, that’s, I would think, the best way to approach this.

STEVE CANNANE: Allan, when it comes to Operation Sovereign Borders and dealing with asylum seekers, operational issues are off limits to journalists.

But when it came to operation Appleby and terror suspects, we saw journalists tipped off about the raids. We also saw vision provided to TV networks. Is there a double standard here?

ALLAN BEHM: I think there is. In fact I’d play it around the other way. I’d have the media present on the vessels to deal with sovereign borders, both for evidentiary reasons but also to be able to show the public that it’s being conducted in a proper way consistent with the values that we stand for.

The idea that you’d tip off the media before a procession of raids such as we’ve had in Sydney and Queensland, the two sets of raids are not desperately related but they’re still – both of them – given enormous media coverage and I think that that is dangerous.

I will concede your point that there are far too many hot head Muslims in our community.

It's time they were locked up for our protection.

Fundamentalist Christians can also call up all the old testament laws
of the Bible which call for the killing of people for
about 30 different offenses including witchcraft
& stoning to death for adultery.
That doesn't mean that every Christian follows those rules.