Few would have predicted that nine months after the October Hamas terrorist attack against Israel, an Australian Labor Party senator would break decades of caucus solidarity and cross the floor of parliament to vote with the crossbench. Nor could anyone have predicted that local uprisings in Syria beginning in March 2011 would eventually see several hundred Australian men and women travel to that country and Iraq to support a group committed to attacking Australia, and that dozens more would help facilitate or conduct attacks in Australia itself.

By contrast, equally significant and tragic world events, such as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine or the civil war in Sudan that has raged for the past 18 months, have made barely a ripple in........

© The Sydney Morning Herald