Domestic terrorism and a mounting scare campaign about it has hit our TV screens recently, as a 16-year-old Muslim boy who stabbed a priest was branded a terrorist by NSW Police and it then located six other teenaged terrorists, including one as young as 14.

An air of dubiousness has pervaded the operation, as Gadigal/Sydney’s Muslim communities reflect on whether their city has been cast back to when the Tony Abbott government was enacting terrorism laws, accompanied by police raids to provide the justification.

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To raise suspicions about the validity of terrorism cases has a clear precedence. The Guardian published details about a case in February, which involved charges laid against a 14-year-old being dropped last October when it became clear that AFP agents had been grooming the boy.

The idea that certain AFP officers had been creating terrorism suspects, to be charged and tried, might easily be dismissed as conspiratorial, or put down to certain officers making misguided decisions.

Yet similar, repeated, cases in the United States tell a different tale.

The AFP investigation that raised eyebrows involved a 13-year-old autistic boy’s parents seeking assistance from Victoria Police in 2021 because their son, known as “TC”, had developed an obsession with the Islamic State.

Police provided the boy with countering violent extremism (CVE) support, while the Joint Counter Terrorism Team (JCTT), comprised of AFP, ASIO and VicPol agents, began a covert operation involving........

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