The suspects were a father and son, aged 50 and 24, authorities have said. The older man, whom state officials named as Sajid Akram, was shot dead. His son was being treated at a hospital.
A news conference by political and law enforcement leaders on Tuesday was the first time officials confirmed their beliefs about the suspects' ideologies. Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said the remarks were based on evidence obtained, including “the presence of Islamic State flags in the vehicle that has been seized.”
There are 25 people still being treated in hospitals after Sunday’s massacre, 10 of them in critical condition. Three of them are patients in a children's hospital.
Also among them is Ahmed al Ahmed, who was captured on video tackling and disarming one assailant, before pointing the man’s weapon at him and then setting it on the ground.
Those killed ranged in age from 10 to 87 years old. They were attending a Hanukkah event at Australia's most famous beach Sunday when the gunshots rang out.
Officials divulged more information as public questions and anger grew on the third day following the attack about how the suspects were able to plan and enact it and whether Australian Jews had been sufficiently protected from rising antisemitism.
The suspects traveled to the Philippines last month, said Mal Lanyon, the Police Commissioner for New South Wales state. Their reasons for the trip and where in the Philippines they went would be probed by investigators, Lanyon said.
He also confirmed that a vehicle removed from the scene, registered to the younger suspect, contained improvised explosive devices.
“I also confirm that it contained two homemade ISIS flags,” Lanyon said.
The Philippines Bureau of Immigration confirmed Tuesday that Sajid Akram traveled to the country from Nov. 1 to Nov. 28 along with Naveed Akram, 24, giving the city of Davao as their final destination. Australian authorities have not named the younger suspect.
Groups of Muslim terrorists, including Abu Sayyaf in the southern Philippines, once expressed support for the Islamic State terrorist group and have hosted small numbers of foreign terrorist combatants from Asia, the Middle East and Europe in the past.
