By Etienne Darcas – Rise to Peace

The massacre at Bondi Beach on 14 December 2025 marked a grim turning point in Australian security history. As families gathered to celebrate the first night of Hanukkah at the iconic beachfront, two gunmen, later to be identified as father and son Sajid and Naveed Akram, opened fire on the crowd, killing fifteen people and wounding over forty others. The attack, which Australian authorities swiftly declared an ISIS-inspired terrorist act targeting the Jewish community, represents the deadliest terrorist incident on Australian soil and the first fatal attack specifically directed at Jewish Australians.

This horrific attack arrived at the culmination of a deeply troubling trend in Australia’s domestic security landscape; one characterized by an escalating pattern of ideologically motivated violence against state institutions and public officials that has accelerated markedly since the COVID-19 pandemic. Understanding the Bondi attack requires situating it within this broader landscape of extremist violence, one that has seen sovereign citizens and anti-government ideologues wage deadly assaults on police officers in rural Australia, fundamentalist Christian terrorists execute law enforcement personnel, and now Islamic State-inspired actors perpetrate mass casualty attacks on religious minorities.

The Attack and Its Immediate Aftermath

The Bondi massacre unfolded with terrifying efficiency that highlighted its premeditated nature. According to court documents released by New South Wales authorities, the Akrams had conducted reconnaissance of the attack site two days prior, walking the footbridge from which they would later fire upon the Hanukkah celebration. On the day of the attack, they drove to the beach, affixed homemade ISIS flags to their vehicle, and at approximately 6:47 pm, began their assault.

The perpetrators also deployed four improvised explosive devices – three aluminium pipe bombs and a tennis ball bomb containing explosive material, gunpowder, and steel ball bearings. Mercifully, none detonated, though police described them as viable weapons. Video evidence recovered from Naveed Akram’s phone showed the pair conducting firearms training in the weeks preceding the attack, and a manifesto-style recording captured them “condemning the acts of Zionists” while displaying allegiance to Islamic State ideology.

Among the fifteen dead were a Holocaust survivor, a ten-year-old girl, and Rabbi Eli Schlanger, a correctional services chaplain. Two police officers were wounded in the response. Sajid Akram, 50, was killed by police at the scene. His son Naveed, 24, an Australian-born citizen, survived with critical injuries and has since been charged with 59 offences, including 15 counts of murder and one count of committing a terrorist act.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese declared the attack had deliberately targeted at the Jewish community on the first day of Chanukah. Australian Federal Police Commissioner Krissy Barrett confirmed that “early indications point to a terrorist attack inspired by Islamic State,” with motivations rooted in antisemitism and jihadist ideology.

Institutional Failures and the Question of Prevention

The political and security fallout from Bondi has been severe. Investigative reporting by The Nightly revealed that the Australian Federal Police’s specialist counter-terrorism surveillance team—established under the Commonwealth High Risk Terrorist Offender regime—had been quietly disbanded just weeks before the massacre due to budgetary constraints. Internal correspondence indicated that funding shortfalls had “limited our ability to fill vacancies,” and the decision was made to dissolve the Canberra-based unit and return its funding to the AFP’s Counter Terrorism and Special Investigations Command.

This revelation proved particularly damaging given that ASIO had previously investigated Naveed Akram in 2019 for six months over alleged extremist associations, determining at the time that he posed no threat. The disbanding of specialist surveillance capabilities mere weeks before the worst terrorist attack in Australian history has raised profound questions about resource allocation and threat prioritization within the national security apparatus.

The AFP Association had, in fact, warned the Albanese Government in November 2025 that the force was suffering “chronic and worsening shortages” of counter-terrorism officers. Their warning proved prescient in the most tragic possible terms.

In response to mounting pressure, particularly from Opposition Leader Sussan Ley and a coalition of teal independent MPs including Monique Ryan, Kate Chaney, Sophie Scamps, and Zali Steggall, Albanese eventually announced a royal commission into the attack and the broader rise of antisemitism in Australia. Former High Court justice Virginia Bell, who previously led the Robodebt royal commission, will oversee the inquiry, which is mandated to deliver its final report by 14 December 2026, exactly one year after the massacre.

The commission’s terms of reference are expansive, encompassing the nature and prevalence of antisemitism in Australia, its key drivers including religiously motivated extremism, the effectiveness of current responses by law enforcement and security agencies, and recommendations to improve social cohesion. It represents a significant governmental concession following weeks of resistance to calls for such an inquiry.

A Pattern of Escalating Violence: From Wieambilla to Porepunkah

While the Bondi attack was distinguished by its Islamic State inspiration and its specific targeting of the Jewish community, it must be understood as part of a broader pattern of ideologically motivated violence that has plagued Australia in recent years;  especially violence that has disproportionately targeted government workers and law enforcement in remote areas.

That the nature of this violence has usually been in remote areas and regional Australia is in of itself not exceptional, for Australia is a country with ample land and wilderness, and with that comes the ability for those who are distrustful of the government and institutions to strike up on the frontier of old and establish semi-autonomous homesteads and communities. Such groupings of properties and collectives usually consist of homesteaders who seek to have a closer relationship with the land and the food that they grow, or who seek to get away from the highly urbanised reality of Australian life, but so too do cults and other, more insidious groups, form.

The Wieambilla shootings of December 2022 perhaps best illustrates this dynamic. On 12 December of that year, four Queensland Police constables arrived at a rural property northwest of Brisbane to conduct a welfare check. Without warning, the property’s three residents—brothers Gareth and Nathaniel Train, and Gareth’s wife Stacey—ambushed the officers with high-powered rifles. Constables Matthew Arnold, 26, and Rachel McCrow, 29, were killed; a third officer, Randall Kirk, was shot in the hip but managed to escape; a fourth, Keely Brough, hid in grass for hours while the perpetrators searched for her and lit fires to flush her out.

A neighbour, Alan Dare, 58, was also killed when he came to investigate the commotion. The six-hour standoff ended when tactical police killed all three perpetrators.

Queensland Police subsequently classified the Wieambilla shootings as Australia’s first fundamentalist Christian terrorist attack. The Trains were religious extremists who subscribed to premillennialism, an apocalyptic Christian belief system, and were deeply embedded in the sovereign citizen movement and online conspiracy communities which have risen to prominence in the wake of the COVID-19 Pandemic in Australia. Gareth Train had claimed the Port Arthur massacre was a false flag operation and that Princess Diana was killed in a “blood sacrifice.” His anti-government views had radicalized significantly during the COVID-19 pandemic, during which he opposed vaccines, lockdowns, and mask mandates.

The parallels with the Porepunkah police shootings of August 2025 are striking. On 26 August, ten Victoria Police officers arrived at a property near the regional town of Porepunkah to execute a warrant against Dezi Freeman, a self-proclaimed sovereign citizen known to authorities. When officers attempted to enter his converted bus dwelling, Freeman opened fire with a homemade shotgun, killing Detective Leading Senior Constable Neal Thompson, 59, who was days away from retirement, and Senior Constable Vadim De Waart-Hottart, 35. A third officer was shot in the leg. Freeman attempted to kill a fourth officer, but his weapon misfired.

What followed was the largest manhunt in Australian history. Freeman fled into the dense bushland of Mount Buffalo National Park, an area he had hiked since age 16 and knew intimately. Nearly 500 officers were deployed initially, with tactical teams from every Australian state and territory, as well as New Zealand, participating in what became the largest tactical police operation in the nation’s history. A $1 million reward, the largest ever offered in Victoria, was announced for information leading to his arrest. Freeman had ‘gone bush’, retreating into the vast hinterlands of the Victorian Alps in a way starkly reminiscent of the Bushrangers of old.

As of this writing, Dezi Freeman remains at large after 147 days, having vanished into the snowy Victorian High Country under winter conditions that many experts initially believed would prove fatal. Whether he perished in the wilderness or remains in hiding—potentially assisted by sympathizers—is unknown. His brother has publicly speculated that Freeman died on a mountain near his residence. Cadaver dogs from Queensland were brought in to search the national park, but no body has been recovered.

Like the Trains, Freeman’s radicalization appears to have accelerated during COVID-19. Sources described his views as having become more extreme during the pandemic; he protested vaccines and lockdowns, refused to wear masks, and rejected the validity of any state authority. He had written online that “the only good cop is a dead cop” and that police “all need to be exterminated.” His firearms licence had been cancelled in 2020. He believed the end times were approaching.

Understanding the Post-COVID Radicalization Pattern

The common thread linking Wieambilla, Porepunkah, and to a lesser extent Bondi is the acceleration of radicalization during and after the COVID-19 pandemic. The pandemic served as a catalyst for extremist ideologies across the political and religious spectrum, providing grievances around government overreach, public health mandates, and perceived threats to individual liberty that extremist movements were well-positioned to exploit.

For sovereign citizens and Christian fundamentalists like the Trains and Freeman, pandemic restrictions confirmed their existing beliefs about government tyranny. Online conspiracy communities flourished as lockdowns drove people into digital spaces where algorithmic amplification and echo chambers intensified radical worldviews. The physical isolation of rural properties—like those in Wieambilla and Porepunkah—created zones where extremist beliefs could be practiced without challenge or intervention.

The Bondi attackers represent a different ideological strand but one that similarly benefited from the global upheavals of recent years. The Islamic State, though territorially defeated in the Middle East, has continued to inspire attacks worldwide through its sophisticated online propaganda apparatus. The Israel-Gaza conflict that erupted in October 2023 provided further radicalizing content and grievances for actors motivated by antisemitic ideologies. The lack of significant diplomatic or humanitarian action to curb the worst excesses of Israel’s Netanyahu government in Gaza in no small way amplified this burgeoning undercurrent of radicalisation taking place.

Australian authorities investigated the Akrams’ nearly month-long stay in Davao City in the southern Philippines, a region with long historical connections to ISIS-affiliated insurgent groups, but concluded that there was “no evidence to suggest they received training or underwent logistical preparation” during the trip. The pair apparently rarely left their hotel room. This suggests that their radicalization and operational planning occurred domestically, within Australia, making the failure to interdict them all the more concerning.

The Security Response and Its Limitations

The response to these attacks has exposed significant gaps in the Australian security architecture. At Bondi, first responders were armed with Glock pistols that lacked the lethal range of the attackers’ rifles and shotguns; a mismatch that contributed to officer injuries and may have cost lives. New South Wales Premier Chris Minns has acknowledged that the responsive ability of police forces needs to change, while stopping short of endorsing full police militarization.

At Porepunkah, a prior risk assessment had concluded that the Victoria Police Special Operations Group would not be required to arrest Freeman. This was a decision that proved catastrophically wrong. The officers who arrived were ambushed before they could respond effectively.

The Wieambilla inquest, which concluded in August 2024 after a marathon five weeks of hearings, examined how four young constables were sent to conduct a routine welfare check at what turned out to be a fortified extremist compound. The coroner is expected to make recommendations on intelligence sharing, risk assessment protocols, and the protection of officers in rural areas.

What emerges from these incidents is a pattern of underestimation, and in particular, of the threat posed by individuals who appear on the radar but are assessed as non-threatening, of the tactical capabilities of extremists who operate from rural properties, and of the organizational challenges in maintaining specialist counter-terrorism capabilities during periods of budgetary pressure.

Legislative and Policy Responses

The Albanese Government has moved on multiple fronts in response to Bondi. Federal Parliament was recalled in January 2026 to pass legislation targeting hate preachers and extremist organizations. New South Wales has passed significantly strengthened gun control measures, and Australia’s states and territories have committed to implementing a National Firearms Register—a reform first promised after Port Arthur in 1996 but never fully realized until now.

Australia and the Philippines have also announced enhanced counter-terrorism cooperation, though Filipino authorities have pushed back strongly against characterizations of their country as an ISIS training ground, noting that insurgent groups in the south are fragmented with poor leadership.

The royal commission announced by Albanese represents the most comprehensive response, with broad powers to compel evidence and testimony. Its examination of antisemitism will necessarily extend beyond the security domain into questions of social cohesion, online radicalization, and the adequacy of hate speech laws.

A Society Under Strain

Australia in early 2026 confronts a security landscape that would have been unrecognizable a decade ago. The nation that pioneered comprehensive gun control after Port Arthur—and which prided itself on having avoided the mass shooting epidemic plaguing the United States—has now experienced its deadliest terrorist attack and its most extensive manhunt for a suspected cop-killer, with police officers gunned down in rural ambushes by citizens who had openly declared their intention to kill.

The ideological diversity of these threats compounds the challenge. Jihadist violence inspired by ISIS, Christian fundamentalist terrorism rooted in apocalyptic belief, and sovereign citizen extremism fuelled by pandemic-era conspiracy theories each require distinct analytical frameworks and intervention strategies. What they share is a willingness to use lethal violence against representatives of the state and against vulnerable communities.

For the Jewish community of Australia, the Bondi massacre has been an unprecedented tragedy. For law enforcement, Wieambilla and Porepunkah have demonstrated that routine duties in rural areas can become death traps. For policymakers, the disbanding of specialist counter-terrorism capabilities weeks before the nation’s worst terrorist attack stands as a cautionary tale about the dangers of short-term budgetary thinking in an era of evolving threats.

The royal commission will provide an opportunity for rigorous examination of what went wrong and what must change. But commissions alone cannot repair the fractures in Australian society that these attacks have exposed; fractures along lines of religion, ideology, and relationship to state authority that have widened dramatically in the post-COVID era.

Australia’s response to Bondi will be judged not only by the prosecutions it secures or the inquiries it conducts, but by its success in addressing the deeper currents of radicalization that have made such violence possible. The challenge is immense. The stakes could not be higher.

---

Rise to Peace is a counterterrorism and peacebuilding organization dedicated to research, education, and policy advocacy on violent extremism. This analysis represents the organization’s independent assessment based on publicly available sources.

By Alex Fitzgerald – Rise to Peace Fellow

The United States is in a confusing period, as is the rest of the world. So much is occurring in the first two weeks of 2026 and so quickly that it proves difficult to stop and analyze an event before the next one grabs our attention. From Venezuela, to Greenland, to the Trump administration’s plans for the military budget and conflicts with the federal reserve, some things slip under the radar of the national news cycle. The shooting of Renee Good in Minneapolis was national news for at least two days, but the media has seemingly turned their attention elsewhere and are avoiding reporting on what led up to the shooting in the context of the city of Minneapolis, and what is happening there now.

Over the past month, Immigration and Customs Enforcement have increased the number of raids and personnel in the Twin Cities Area. The news surrounding the new year that was coming out of Minneapolis was concerning the possibility of fraud in the day care centers within the mostly Somali neighborhoods, made popular by right-wing influencer Nick Shirley. However, even after the Department of Health and Human Services cut off much of the childcare funding for the state of Minnesota and the FBI surged investigations into the issue, it seemed that Shirley was working off of potentially flawed information. The investigation into childcare fraud had merits, however the main perpetrators of the fraud case were arrested and convicted in March of 2025. When the FBI had investigated the centers that were shown in Nick Shirley’s video, they were found to be operating as normal.[1]

The surge in ICE personnel, however, began before the video by Nick Shirley was filmed, and had nothing to do with the alleged fraud that was highlighted. The surge is part of the Trump administrations aptly named “Operation Metro Surge,” part of the broader plan to crack down on illegal immigration in 2026 much heavier than it already has in 2025. The plan intends to begin with mass raids in both New Orleans, accompanied by National Guard troops, and in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area of Minnesota.[2] Why these two cities have been targeted first is one that can only be speculated on; however, the answers may be political. New Orleans is an overwhelmingly blue city and the largest city in the state of Louisiana which is overwhelmingly red. Therefore, the city which holds much of the power in the state has conflicted much with the Baton Rouge based state government of Jeff Landry. Landry, Trump’s special envoy to Greenland, has been a staunch ally of the president’s administration since coming into office in 2024. Minnesota seems just as political. Donald Trump and the state of Minnesota have sparred during the past year of his presidency. Representative Ilhan Omar, whose district encompasses most of Minneapolis, has been a staunch opposer of the Trump presidency. Trump has responded in turn with accusations of corruption, insults against her Somali nationality and her Muslim religion. Trump supporters online have also targeted Omar with accusations of fraud on her citizenship forms. Minnesota’s governor Tim Walz, who was the running mate of Kamala Harris in 2024, also has been staunchly opposed to actions of the Trump administration.

Safe to say, there is no love lost between Donald Trump and the state of Minnesota. Therefore, the surge in ICE personnel can be explained as being a political stunt, or a more sinister retribution against a state which continues to be a thorn in the side of the current administration. The surge was met with fierce backlash combined with harsh Minnesota winter conditions, combined with the fact that the IIHF World Juniors hockey tournament was occurring through the new year, bringing in fans, family, and players from all over the world into the Minneapolis-St. Paul area. Multiple protests against ICE’s presence were occurring simultaneously throughout the area and ICE’s efforts were being frustrated by a lack of guidance on where raids were to occur.[3] Pressure was being built up in the cold Twin Cities area and with every party involved on edge, it would be easy to have the situation boil over.

On the 7^th of January, Renee Good’s car was blocking multiple ICE vehicles en route to a raid. Agents swarmed her car and as she pulled forward and her car came into contact with agent Jonathan Ross, he drew his weapon and fired three shots into Good’s side window. The shooting was contentious and while the Trump administration and politically aligned users online were quick to defend Ross, claiming Good attempted to run him over, the shooting was ill-received by the people, and government, of Minneapolis.[4] To make matters worse for the image of ICE, the shooting was captured by Good’s wife who was filming from the curb, and circulated online. Adding insult to injury, another ICE agent’s body cam footage of Good, moments before the shooting, displays a calm and collected woman, not a protester, bringing into question if Renee Good acted with hostile intent. Trump and allies online dug deep into Renee Good and her wife’s background, attempting to label her as a violent protester, drawing the ire of members from both sides of the aisle, who view the shooting correctly as a tragedy.[5] Protests began erupting all over Minnesota as well as throughout the United States. A vigil was held later that day which was attended by the Mayor, Jacob Frey, city council members, and thousands of citizens. The next day, schools were closed due to the extent of the protests.[6]

In the days since the shooting, protests have only accelerated. After another ICE involved shooting in Portland, demonstrations have started to take hold all across the country. The entire city of Minneapolis is seemingly united against the ICE raids currently taking place in their city, from Jacob Frey to Tim Walz and Ilhan Omar, the protests are widespread and the reaction from the Right is getting more forceful.[7] The Trump administration has been pushing back hard against the Minnesota protests specifically, ordering more ICE agents from the Department of Homeland Security into the city in order to extend the operational remit of Operation Metro Surge.[8] Donald Trump specifically has ordered investigations into the widow of Renee Good in order to smear her image in his effort to show Good as a violent protester/instigator. Because of this effort, and a decision by the FBI and DHS to not investigate the shooting, multiple government officials have tendered their resignations. Four leaders of the civil rights division of the DOJ quit on the morning of Monday the 12^th, and four federal prosecutors resigned over ICE’s widow investigation push. In the wake of the protests, which are still ongoing at the time of this article’s writing, dozens of protesters have been arrested, tense scenes of ICE agents with guns drawn at protestors have been showcased on social media, and tear gas has been used on crowds by ICE agents who have been attempting to continue the raids that began in December.[9] Finally most recently, state officials have begun official proceedings to sue the federal government on account of the violence currently taking place in their capitol.[10]

With all the escalation in Minneapolis, there does not seem to be a hint of restraint shown by federal forces. Despite Donald Trumps efforts to show the world that protests will not stop the raids in Minnesota, citing a biblical day of reckoning, ICE is also quietly issuing “refreshers” on the constitutional rights of citizens when the two confront each other.[11] As the federal agents and the citizens of the twin cities are at each other’s throats, this could indicate a cooling of tensions. On the other hand, as protests continue to erupt throughout the country, where injuries keep occurring when the two opposing sides clash, this seems unlikely.[12] Escalations have continued, as on January 13^th, thousands of ICE agent’s identities were leaked online, prompting many to fear that the shooting of Renee Good was a watershed moment in Donald Trump’s immigration crusade.[13]

So, as to the question of ‘why Minneapolis?’ is asked on morning television and national news networks, the answer is potentially shattering. The truth is Minneapolis is different. While anti-ICE protests in the past year have done little to stifle the apparent overreach of the DHS, Minneapolis seems different, because it is working. ICE raids are being thwarted, and the protests are forcing agents to resort to the type of violence that tarnishes its already murky image. This is not the non-violent protests the country has seen over the past year like the “no kings” protests. Instead, this is the sort of protest that unfolded under Donald Trumps first term as president, during the summer of 2020. Protests like the ones in Portland, Philadelphia, Kenosha, and indeed Minneapolis. It would be foolish to forget that this is not the first time Minneapolis has been at the epicenter of national movements. In May of 2020, the event that sparked the race protests that lasted for months was the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis. While the answer to why Minneapolis is being targeted by the Trump administration is political speculation, the answer to why Minneapolis was primed to react in this way may lie in its recent history. It has seen the kind of community movement that is happening now, unfold before and, while less destructive, the kind of perceived threat to the city in the form of ICE was never going to be received well. Whether the Trump administration was ignorant to this fact is also always going to have a speculative answer, but if operation Metro Surge has done anything, it has been to unite the community of the twin cities against an already hostile federal government.

---

[1] Phil Helsel and Julia Ainsley, “Minnesota Department Finds Child Care Centers Targeted in Viral Video Operating Normally,” NBC News, January 2, 2026.

[2] Suzanne Gamboa, Julia Ainsley and Priscilla Thompson, “Federal Agents Begin Immigration Operations in New Orleans and Minneapolis,” NBC News, December 3, 2025.

[3] Gabe Gutierrez and Susan Kroll, “ICE Operation Shows the Difficulty of Immigration Arrests Amid Pushback in Frigid Minnesota,” NBC News, December 11, 2025.

[4] Ray Sanchez, “Whistles, then Gunfire: How the Deadly ICE Shooting Unfolded in Minneapolis,” CNN, January 10, 2026.

[5] Maria Sacchetti, “ICE Officer in Minneapolis Shooting Was Dragged by a Driver Months Earlier,” Washington Post, January 8, 2026.

[6] Trevor Mitchell, “Minneapolis Vigil draws Thousands as City Reels Following ICE Shooting,” Minn Post, January 7, 2026.

Rebecca Santana and Associated Press, “Protests Against ICE Spread Across U.S. After Shootings in Minneapolis and Portland,” PBS News, January 10, 2026.

[7] Mark Vancleave and Tim Sullivan, “Minnesota Protesters, Agents Repeatedly Square Off while Prosecutors Quit after Renee Good’s Death,” Associated Press, January 14, 2026.

[8] Maria Dunbar, “Noem Says Homeland Security is Sending ‘Hundreds More’ Agents to Minneapolis as Protests Erupt in US,” The Guardian, January 11, 2026.

[9] Ana Faguy, “Thousands March and Dozens Arrested in Minneapolis Protests against ICE,” BBC, January 11, 2026.

Michael Dorgan, “Fireworks-Wielding Agitators Clash with Federal Agents outside Minneapolis Federal Building,” FOX News, January 13, 2026.

[10] David Nakamura, Brianna Tucker, and Ben Brasch, “Minnesota Sues DHS, ICE over Immigration Enforcement,” Washington Post, January 12, 2026.

[11] Ken Klippenstein, “Immigration Agents Terrified of ICE Backlash After Shooting,” Ken Klippenstein, January 13, 2026.

[12] “Anti-ICE Protester Blinded by Federal Agent During Demonstration, Family Says,” Yahoo News, January 2026.

[13] Mike Bedigan, “Personal Information of 4,500 ICE and Border Patrol Agents Leaked Online,” The Independent, January 14, 2026.

By Caroline Thomas – Rise to Peace Fellow

            The Islamic Republic of Iran is currently experiencing one of the most significant periods of civil unrest in decades. Beginning in late December 2025 with protests over declining economic conditions, the turmoil has evolved into a nationwide challenge to Iranian political order, and protestors have demanded systemic change. The uprisings have drawn international attention, increasing diplomatic tensions and threats of external intervention. This report examines the components of the unrest, analyzes its further security implications, and situates it among concurrent global crises, including recent developments in Venezuela and the ongoing conflict in Gaza.

            The current wave of protests began on December 28, 2025, and was initially driven by widespread economic hardship, including rapidly rising inflation, food and fuel prices, and the collapse of currency values [1]. Demonstrations began in Tehran’s Grand Bazaar [2], an urban hub that is the economic epicenter of Iran, housing the world’s largest covered market. As the focus of the demonstrations have evolved, protests have now broadened across all 31 Iranian provinces and spread to diverse social groups, including students, workers, and professionals. This marks one of the broadest demonstrations since the “Woman, Life, Freedom” movement [3] that followed the death of Mahsa Amini in 2022.

            Iranian authorities have responded to the unrest by deploying police, Basij militia, and Revolutionary Guard units to attempt to suppress demonstrations. These forces have been authorized to use lethal force against protestors, including live ammunition, causing the death toll to rise to over 500 deaths [4] and more than 10,000 arrests, as of the writing of this piece. Iranian authorities challenge these figures, and frame the unrest as violent “riots” in an attempt to justify the use of force. However, exact casualty figures are difficult to confirm due to the nationwide internet and communications blackout imposed by the Iranian regime. The Iranian foreign minister claims the chaos has “come under total control,” [5] but as the demonstrations enter the 16th day and very few videos from Iran emerge on social media, it is difficult to say whether or not the authorities’ response has actually had an effect on stunting the momentum of the movement.

Analysis

            Domestic Drivers: The core driving factor of the protests are deeply-rooted economic grievances, including inflation, poverty, unemployment, and the collapse of the national currency (the rial). The sentiment among protesters is that these ongoing economic hardships are symptoms of broader political dysfunction and systemic corruption in the Iranian regime as a whole [6]. As a result, current demonstrations are aimed more at targeting the theocratic structure rather than single policies or individual Iranian officials, rendering them leaderless and decentralized. The discontent is broadly based and spread among a wide group of societal members, including professionals, ethnic minorities, urban youth, and workers.

            Regime Legitimacy and Narrative: The Iranian leadership has responded with a reframing of the ongoing narrative, with officials claiming that the unrest is actually a foreign-backed plot [7] by the United States and Israel to further incite instability and justify external intervention. This framing of the ongoing crisis demonstrates the long-standing regime discourse that internal dissent is a part of a broader war waged by countries against Iran.

            Security Implications: The rapid spread of the intense protests in Iran poses direct and significant risks to domestic stability and security in the country. The scale of participation across wide social groups suggests a lack of consensus around the Iranian regime’s legitimacy. Additionally, the use of lethal force, arrests and detentions, and threats of harsh punishments could further radicalize demonstrators and deepen social grievances against the Iranian regime, which could create conditions for prolonged unrest.

            International Security: Foreign governments are monitoring Iran closely. The United States, under President Trump, has announced that it is weighing “very strong options” in response to the uprising in Iran, including military strikes, cyber operations, increased sanctions, or support for communication networks moving into Iran [8]. This raises the concern for a direct US-Iranian confrontation, as Iran has warned that any external military intervention will result in retaliation strikes against US and Israeli bases and targets. Unintended escalation between major powers significantly affects international order and stability.

            Humanitarian Concern: The nationwide internet and phone blackout in Iran severely limits both information and resource flow, and inhibits independent verification of events, including death tolls and arrest logs. International monitoring is hampered, which often results in populations struggling to organize, seek assistance from international bodies, or share evidence of abuses and ongoing activities within the country.

Global Context: Venezuela

            The unrest in Iran is unfolding almost parallel to the US intervention in Venezuela, where President Maduro was captured in the early days of 2026. Both strategically and perceptually, this event has major implications for the leadership in Tehran. Over the past decade, Iran and Venezuela have strengthened their relationship, uniting over shared status as a major oil producer, falling under Western sanctions, and mutual opposition to US foreign policy. Tehran has begun using Caracas as a means to bolster influence in the Western hemisphere, as proxy groups, like Hezbollah, have established presence there [9]. Venezuelan operations aided in the transfer of Iranian drones, revenue streams, and criminal financial activity linked to Hezbollah. These gold trading, narco networks, and other illicit flows both fund Iranian militant activity and expand influence outside of the region.

            Maduro’s capture sends a strong message to Iranian leadership in Tehran. First, it removed a strategic Iranian ally, as Venezuela bolstered Iran, particularly in the Western hemisphere. However, more importantly, the capture signals to Tehran’s leadership that the US is willing and able to take action against hostile regimes even during periods of internal instability. While Iranian officials have condemned the US capture of Maduro as a “dangerous law-breaking,” [10] it is evident that Iran could fall to the same fate as Venezuela.

            This threat of US involvement reinforces a security narrative of external encirclement for Iran. Within Tehran, there are fears that the same logic used by the Trump administration will be applied to Iran should the stability conditions further deteriorate. Thus, this helps to explain Iran’s increasingly aggressive approach towards the US, including warnings of retaliation in the case of American forces intervening in the country [8]. These threats of retaliation both deter external action and reinforce regime legitimacy domestically by framing the discontent as part of a broader geopolitical conflict.

            Beyond posturing, the loss of the Venezuelan alliance undermines a tangible, strategic partnership that gave Iran economic and political benefits. The disruption of this weakens Tehran’s ability to project its influence in the Western hemisphere and constrains the proxy network of Hezbollah. US officials, like Secretary of State Marco Rubio, stated that the dismantling of Iranian presence in Venezuela is a matter of hemispheric security. This emphasizes the important notion that Iran’s activities in Venezuela have major implications for criminal networks and ideological projection beyond the Middle East region.

Regional Context: Gaza and the Middle East

            While Iran’s inner turmoil is different from the conflict in Gaza, the ongoing instability in the Israel-Gaza context remains a critical backdrop that reflects regional security dynamics. The late 2025 ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas, although seemingly promising at the time, has since rendered unstable due to repeated violations of the agreement. Targeted strikes continue, which can be seen in recent drone attacks that demonstrate the persistence of violence and conflict in the Gaza Strip [11].

            Iran’s support for the Palestinian cause and militant groups, like Hamas and Hezbollah, have historically been pillars of Iranian regional strategy, framing it as part of a broader resistance against Israel and Western influence. Tehran, despite the formal ceasefires, has continued to assert backing for Palestinian actors and allied militias, further underscoring competition with Israel. The persistence of instability in Gaza connects, in several ways, with the unrest in Iran.

            Iran’s Narrative: Tehran frequently utilizes the Gaza conflict as a means of justification for its regional policies and mobilization of national sentiment. Iran often presents itself as a “defender” of the Palestinian cause, seeking to cultivate external legitimacy [12]. The inconsistency of the ceasefire complicates this, by showing that regardless of Iran’s proxy support, there has not been a resilient resolution to the violence in Gaza.

            Regional Insecurity: The Gaza crisis contributes to broader Middle East insecurity and the overall volatile environment that is plagued with inconsistent alliances, non-sustainable ceasefire agreements, and ongoing conflict between state and non-state actors. The entire Middle East environment is vulnerable to different conflict spillover and intersection [13]. Although the Gaza ceasefire did reduce the scale of hostilities that were occurring, violence persists in the form of retaliatory strikes and militant violence, demonstrating the constant potential for escalation within the entire Middle East region.

            Allocation of Resources: Iran has allocated both financial and logistical resources to Gaza as a means of Palestinian support [14]. However, as internal Iranian unrest intensifies, these resources are strained. The lack of resources available for external allocation could force Tehran to reduce support in Gaza and shift their emphasis internally.

            Proxy Networks: Militant groups in Gaza and Lebanon continue to operate within an environment where power vacuums, leadership transitions, and competing authorities shape regional dynamics [15]. Iran has significant influence in these networks, but their role remains vulnerable due to shifts in regional alignments and geopolitical pressures. Conflicts in Gaza directly affect Iran’s strategic outlook, as new leaders and allies seek external negotiations that may not fully align with Iranian objectives.

            Ultimately, the Gaza conflict and the collapse of the ceasefire are a part of a broader environment of insecurity in the Middle East that directly intersects with Iran’s ongoing internal crisis. While not a direct cause and effect between the events, they both contribute to the regional dynamic that plays a major role in influencing Iran’s foreign policy.

Global Geopolitical Risk Outlook

            The Iranian crisis is not the only ongoing global disruption. This event sits among US interventions, Middle East conflict, and alliance shifts which are all contributing to the fracturing of the global security environment. The overlap between these crises complicates international response and amplifies risk perceptions. There are significant implications, both for Iran and the larger international community, of the ongoing internal crisis in Iran.

            Iranian Implications: For Iranian policy and governance, the current outlook based on ongoing events is one of vulnerability and continued instability. First, intensified repression of protestors may work for the short term goal of curbing the momentum of the movement, but it will likely deepen societal grievances against Iranian leadership and therefore prolong instability. Further, economic conditions are likely to worsen as discontent persists, further exacerbating the domestic issue. Lastly, fractures within Iranian security and elite circles may form, making control increasingly difficult, ultimately leading to prolonged conflict.

            Regional Implications: As other countries, like the US and Israel, weigh in on the Iranian conflict, there may be escalation leading to a broader conflict. Iran’s continued Palestinian support and now Israel’s condemnation [16] of the Iranian authorities is balancing on the edge of deepening the already ongoing regional conflict in the Middle East. Now, due to the strain of Iranian resources, authorities in Tehran may shift their regional strategy and reduce regional engagements to focus on internal stability. However, they may also shift to externalize conflict and mobilize internal nationalist sentiments.

            Global Implications: External powers are going to have difficult decisions to make, as Iran threatens retaliation on any external intervention, especially by the US. However, it is important for external nations to monitor the Iranian crisis for humanitarian rights issues and democratic collapse. International pressures on Iran will likely begin with humanitarian channels and sanctions policies, in an effort to avoid escalation while still addressing the human cost.

            Humanitarian Implications: Due to the information and communication blackout in Iran, humanitarian response is significantly hindered. International organizations are challenged in terms of verifying abuses, documenting violations, and most importantly, delivering aid. Because of this, it is plausible that the death toll may increase as the conflict persists and aid is stalled.

            The ongoing protests in Iran represent an important era of political unrest, economic despair, and mobilization of society. While it began as an expression of discontent over economic conditions, the crisis has now evolved into a nationwide discontent with the Iranian political order. The Iranian response, including the harsh crackdown on demonstrators, suppression of information via the blackout, and crediting of the unrest to foreign adversaries has drawn both domestic and international tensions. As the crisis continues to unfold, the implications extend beyond Iranian borders. Middle East stability, US-Iranian relations, and global geopolitical balances are at risk. The situation in Iran highlights the interconnected nature of modern political crises, where an internal issue can draw international attention.

            Managing the Iranian crisis is going to require international diplomacy, focus on human rights, and efforts to address economic discontent. Without engagement, the repression and resistance may lead to prolonged instability and ultimately, will lead to international consequences.

Sources

[1] “Iran’s currency slides to new low, dollar at 1.47 million rials.” 2026. Iran International.

[2] Shamim, Sarah. 2026. “What we know about the protests sweeping Iran.” Al Jazeera.

[3] Bazafkan, Homa. n.d. ““Women, Life, Freedom” a new revolutionary era in Iran.” VIDC.

[4] Hafezi, Parisa, Rami Ayyub, and Maayan Lubell. 2026. “Deaths from Iran protests reach more than 500, rights group says.” Reuters.

[5] Christou, William, and Deepa Parent. 2026. “Iran foreign minister claims protest unrest has ‘come under total control.’” The Guardian.

[6] Rashid, Inzamam. 2026. “Is the Iranian regime on the verge of collapse?” Monocle.

[7] Kelliher, Fiona, and Edna Mohamed. 2026. “Iran protests live: Unrest ‘stoked and fueled’ by foreign elements – Tehran.” Al Jazeera.

[8] Torbati, Yeganeh, Niha Masih, and Abbie Cheeseman. 2026. “Iran says it’s ready for ‘war’ or dialogue as Trump weighs response to protests.” The Washington Post.

[9] Pelayo, Joze, Kirsten Fontenrose, and Ellie Sennett. 2026. “The Venezuela-Iran connection and what Maduro’s capture means for Tehran, explained.” Atlantic Council.

[10] Mortazavi, Mahsa. 2026. “Iran International.” Iran strongly condemns US attack on Venezuela.

[11] Al-Mughrabibi, Nidal. 2026. “Israeli-backed group kills a senior Hamas police officer in Gaza, threatens more attacks.” Reuters.

[12] Nweiran, Razan, Ahmed Adel, and Sayed Ghoneim. 2025. “Missiles and Meaning: Iran’s Strategic Use of Religious Rhetoric.” IGSDA.

[13] “The Danger of Regional War in the Middle East.” 2024. The International Crisis Group.

[14] “Captured Documents Show Iranian Support for Hamas in the Gaza Strip.” 2024. The Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center.

[15] Fadel, Leila. 2025. “Gaza power vacuum adds new hurdles to Israel-Hamas ceasefire.” NPR.

[16] Lidman, Melanie. 2026. “Iranian protests are growing. Israel is watching closely.” AP News.

Etienne Darcas | Rise to Peace | January 2026

The diagram appears rather innocuous at first glance. A series of boxes laid out and connected by arrows, the kind of systems architecture one might find in any corporate strategy deck. Yet this particular schematic, that which the Pentagon calls an OV-1 diagram, traces the operational logic of how artificial intelligence transforms raw surveillance data into targeting decisions. Intelligence, Surveillance, Target Acquisition, Reconnaissance. ISTAR. The bureaucratic acronym belies the machinery it describes, for it is a technological apparatus that harvests human data, processes it through algorithmic systems, and outputs coordinates for kinetic action. In plain terms, what is called a ‘kill chain’.

What demands our attention now is not merely the existence of such systems, for their deployment in theatres from Gaza to Ukraine has been extensively documented, but rather their accelerating migration from foreign battlefields and into domestic contexts. The surveillance architectures that enabled what Amnesty International described as “live-streamed genocide” in Gaza are not confined to distant conflict zones. Rather, they are being integrated into American law enforcement infrastructure with remarkable speed and minimal democratic oversight. Understanding this trajectory requires us to examine how contemporary warfare has fundamentally mutated, and with it, the relationship between the state, the individual, and the technological mediation of violence.

The Architecture of Fifth Generation Warfare

Traditional military doctrine conceived of warfare as the clash of organised forces across defined battlefields. Even as theorists acknowledged war’s political character – Clausewitz’s famous dictum that war is politics continued by other means – they understood it as fundamentally about the physical control of territory and the destruction of enemy forces. This conception has become dangerously inadequate in our current moment.

What military strategists now term Fifth Generation Warfare (5GW) represents a categorical shift in how conflict is waged. As Professor Armin Krishnan argues in his examination of the doctrine, 5GW “bypasses the battlefield and targets society as a whole, rather than its military forces.” The objective is no longer territorial conquest but the manipulation of perception, the colonisation of what defence planners call the “cognitive domain.” Violence becomes dispersed, often covert, designed to produce psychological and social effects rather than purely military outcomes.

The ISTAR systems at the heart of this transformation serve a dual function. Kinetically, they enable precision targeting through the drone strikes and guided munitions that have become the signature of contemporary conflict. Their more significant role, however, lies in the construction of what the military terms a “common operating picture”: a unified view across all fighting domains, be it land, air, maritime, space, cyber, and cognitive, that enables coordinated action across multiple vectors simultaneously. Social media monitoring, influence operations, economic pressure, and conventional military force become integrated components of a single strategic apparatus.

The French philosopher Paul Virilio, writing decades before the current technological moment and AI boom, identified the essential logic at work. In his concept of “dromology”, the study of speed as the determining factor in warfare and politics, Virilio recognised that modern conflict would increasingly be fought at the speed of information rather than the speed of armies. “The state of emergency, the age of intensiveness, is linked to the primacy of speed,” he observed. This prescient warning, now, seems to have been realised in how we observe warfare conducted at algorithmic velocity, where targeting decisions that once required human deliberation are compressed into milliseconds of machine processing.

From Gaza to Denver: The Domestic Migration of Military Surveillance

The technologies developed for foreign conflict zones do not remain abroad. This is not conspiracy but institutional logic. Defence contractors, as a rule, seek new markets and ever high returns on their investments; law enforcement agencies seek new capabilities; and the political barriers between military and domestic application have proven remarkably porous, much to the detriment of individual rights to privacy and the well-being of civil society.

We can observe the trajectory of drone surveillance as a case study here. The same platforms that provide persistent aerial observation over conflict zones, be they tracking individuals, mapping social networks or identifying patterns of life, are now being deployed over American cities. Denver, Los Angeles, Chicago. The Flock and Skydio systems being integrated into municipal police departments operate on fundamentally similar principles to military ISR platforms: the collection of vast quantities of surveillance data, its algorithmic processing, and its transformation into actionable intelligence. The difference is one of degree rather than kind. In fact, we can see a remarkably, if not disturbing, similarity in the language of the foreign battlefield transposed onto a domestic application when reading about these programs. Skydio markets its drone surveillance products as “a force multiplier for your agency” and lists it military capabilities and use-cases directly adjacent to its law enforcement section, highlighting the intended symbiosis of the domestic, policing application and the military one.

The implications, though, extend beyond aerial platforms. Palantir Technologies, whose software has been central to military and intelligence operations, also provides the analytical backbone for Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The company’s Gotham platform enables the integration of disparate data streams from financial records, travel histories, social media activity and biometric data into unified surveillance profiles. What began as legitimate and warranted counterterrorism capabilities has been repurposed for immigration enforcement, predictive policing, and domestic security operations.

All this follows a certain logic of simulation, or rather, these simulations and abstractions of threats in real space: systems designed for one context become abstracted, detached from their original purpose, and deployed according to their own internal logic rather than any external referent. The question is no longer whether a particular target poses a genuine threat but whether they match the algorithmic pattern of threat. The model potentially becomes more real than the reality it ostensibly represents. We run the risk of not looking at the risk profile of a situation and making our own human assessments in favour of an automatically calibrated algorithmic assessment, which is culturally reinforced as being infallible. But data comes from humans and the human experience, and so is almost certainly always fallible as humans are as a reflection of our own biases, desires and contradictory inputs.

Hybrid Operations and the Weaponisation of Information

The ISTAR apparatus does not merely enable kinetic strikes. Its more insidious application lies in what military doctrine terms “hybrid operations” in the integration of conventional military action with information warfare, economic coercion, and covert influence campaigns. When the internet becomes a battlefield, the distinction between combatant and civilian, between wartime and peacetime, begins to dissolve.

The cognitive domain of public opinion, social media, influence and reputation becomes a legitimate target for manipulation. As digital warfare scholars P.W. Singer and Emerson Brooking observe, “Power on this battlefield is thus measured not by physical strength or high-tech hardware, but by the command of attention.” A tweet can determine a drone strike target. A coordinated disinformation campaign can destabilise a government. The boundaries between military action and information operation become increasingly indistinct.

This has profound implications for how we understand emerging threats. Traditional counter-terrorism frameworks focus on identifiable organisations, hierarchical structures, ideological coherence. But these are increasingly outdated conceptual frameworks regarding terrorism, applicable increasingly only for the terrorism of previous decades, rather than the liminal and asynchronous nature of terror today.  5GW operates through ambiguity, through activities that are difficult to perceive as war precisely because they do not conform to our inherited categories. The operation remains covert not through secrecy but through categorical confusion, for all such actions could be criminal, could be political, could be military, but nonetheless resist definitive classification.

What this means practically is that the surveillance apparatus constructed for “foreign” adversaries inevitably turns inward. The same systems that monitor Telegram channels for extremist content monitor domestic social media. The same analytical tools that map insurgent networks map protest movements. The institutional logic of maximum surveillance, once established, does not recognise jurisdictional boundaries.

The Narrative Apparatus

Hybrid warfare requires not only the surveillance and targeting capabilities of ISTAR but also control of the narrative environment. The kinetic action is often less significant than its mediation in how it is presented, interpreted, and integrated into public consciousness.

This explains the outsized role of media institutions in contemporary conflict, such as  The New York Times preferencing of Palantir executives for scoops rather than whistleblowers, allowing Palantir to effectively sculpt the mediation of truth in tandem with one of the most prestigious papers of record in America. Both claim to be systems of record, to arbitrate fact from fiction. Both exercise enormous power in determining which narratives circulate and which are suppressed. When legacy media platforms editorial decisions about which conflicts to cover, which sources to cite, which framings to adopt, they become willing participants in hybrid warfare operations domestically and abroad.

The concentration of such narrative power in a small number of institutional actors creates dangerous vulnerabilities. When major media outlets fail to challenge the premises of military and intelligence operations, they become functionally complicit in their legitimisation. One striking instantiation of this recently was the news that the New York Times and Washington Post both knew of the upcoming illegal strikes on Venezuela and plan to capture its president, Maduro, in an act that drew widespread condemnation, and yet chose not to report on it.  The same institutional gatekeeping that once provided some check on state power can become an instrument of it, laundering official narratives through the credibility of journalistic independence.

This is not to suggest conspiratorial coordination. The dynamic is more structural than intentional. Access journalism creates dependencies. Source relationships generate obligations. The competitive pressure for scoops incentivises deference to official sources or higher-ranking sources. The result is a media ecosystem that, whatever the intentions of individual journalists, tends to reproduce rather than challenge the narratives of institutional power.

Implications for Counter-Terrorism and Policy

For those of us working in counter-terrorism and security research, these developments demand a fundamental reassessment of our analytical frameworks.

First, we must recognise that the technologies of surveillance and targeting cannot be neatly confined to legitimate counter-terrorism applications. The same capabilities that enable the disruption of genuine terrorist networks can be and are being repurposed for political surveillance, immigration enforcement, and the suppression of dissent. Technical capability tends toward maximal application absent robust institutional constraints and the dual-use of technologies or programs that may have had a more strictly counter-terrorism purpose originally for other domestic applications should be cause for concern.

Second, the concept of “terrorism” itself is being instrumentalised within hybrid warfare contexts. When the same analytical tools and targeting logics are applied to protest movements, immigrant communities, and political opposition as to genuine security threats, the category becomes a vector for repression rather than a meaningful analytical distinction. The expansion of FBI domestic terrorism designations to include categories defined more by political orientation than operational capability represents precisely this danger.

Third, the cognitive domain requires sustained analytical attention. The information environment through which publics understand conflict, threat, and security is itself a contested space. Disinformation, influence operations, and narrative manipulation are not peripheral to security concerns – they are central to how contemporary conflict is waged. Counter-terrorism research that ignores this dimension misses a fundamental aspect of the threat landscape.

Finally, we must attend to the question of democratic accountability. The speed at which ISTAR systems operate, the opacity of algorithmic decision-making, and the classified nature of their deployment create profound challenges for democratic oversight. When targeting decisions are made at machine speed, when surveillance operates through proprietary algorithms, when the categories of threat are determined by systems that resist public scrutiny, the possibility of meaningful accountability becomes increasingly remote.

Toward Resistance

The trajectory traced here is not inevitable. We must remember that technologies are social products, shaped by institutional choices, regulatory frameworks, and political struggle. The domestication of military surveillance capabilities is a policy choice, not a natural law.

What resistance looks like in this context remains contested. Some advocate for technical solutions like encryption, digital security practices and platform alternatives that resist centralised surveillance. Others focus on regulatory intervention in the form of legislation that constrains algorithmic decision-making, mandates transparency, establishes meaningful oversight mechanisms. Still others emphasise the need for broader political mobilisation against the national security state and its technological infrastructure.

None of these approaches is sufficient in isolation. The challenge is structural, embedded in the institutional arrangements that govern technology development, deployment, and oversight. Meaningful response requires simultaneous action across multiple domains: technical countermeasures, regulatory reform, political organising, and the patient work of public education about the systems that increasingly govern our lives.

What cannot be sustained is ignorance. The kill chains being constructed in our name, the surveillance apparatus expanding under the banner of security, the erosion of the boundaries between military and civilian, foreign and domestic; all these developments demand our attention and our response. The alternative, otherwise, is a world in which the cognitive domain itself becomes occupied territory.

Etienne Darcas is Program Lead for Rise to Peace. His research focuses on digital radicalization, hybrid threats, and algorithmic amplification of violent content.