Explosive-laden caravan plot was a hoax, say Australian police

A caravan found packed with explosives in outer Sydney earlier this year was part of a "fabricated terrorism plot" concocted by criminals, Australian police have said.

The caravan, which was found in north-western Sydney on 19 January, contained enough explosives to produce a 40m-wide blast, along with a note displaying antisemitic messages and a list of Jewish synagogues.

Its discovery, following a spate of antisemitic attacks in Australia, triggered widespread panic.

But on Monday, Australian Federal Police (AFP) revealed that they knew "almost immediately" that the caravan was "essentially a criminal con job".

AFP's deputy commissioner of national security, Krissy Barrett, said investigators within the New South Wales Joint Counter Terrorism Team believed that the caravan was "part of a fabricated terrorism plot".

Authorities arrived at that belief based on information they already had, the ease with which they found the caravan and the visibility of the explosives contained inside – as well as the fact that there was no detonator.

Yet police refrained from telling the public that they believed the plot was fake "out of an abundance of caution", as they continued to receive tip-offs about other related terror plots. They are now confident that these tip-offs were also fabricated, Ms Barrett said.

The fake caravan plot involved several people with different levels of involvement, according to police. Between them, they had planned to purchase a caravan, load it with explosives and antisemitic materials and leave it in a specific location, before informing law enforcement about "an impending terror attack against Jewish Australians".

Ms Barrett described it as "an elaborate scheme contrived by organised criminals, domestically and from offshore", adding that the leader of the plot maintained a distance and hired alleged local criminals to carry out parts of the operation.

That individual is a known organised crime figure, Ms Barrett confirmed. She also added that while no arrests had been made in relation to the incident, police have a number of ongoing targets both in Australia and offshore.

"Too many criminals are accused of paying others to carry out antisemitic or terrorism incidents to get our attention or divert our resources," Ms Barrett said. She also noted that police believe "the person pulling the strings wanted changes to their criminal status".

Criminals in these kinds of scenarios often leverage the exchange of information into law enforcement for some kind of personal gain, mostly around sentence reduction, Ms Barrett explained.

BBC News contacted AFP for more details on the suspected agenda of those behind the caravan hoax, but received no further comment.

"Regardless of the motivation of those responsible for this fake plot, this has had a chilling effect on the Jewish community," Ms Barrett said in her statement.

"What organised crime has done to the Jewish community is reprehensible, and it won't go without consequence. There was also unwarranted suspicion directed at other communities – and that is also reprehensible."

Separately, New South Wales police arrested 14 people on Monday morning as part of Strike Force Pearl: a police operation established in December 2024 to investigate antisemitic hate crimes across Sydney.

The establishment of the Strike Force followed a string of antisemitic attacks in Australia in late-2024, including the vandalism of a Jewish school in Sydney's eastern suburbs and the arson of a childcare centre, which was set alight and sprayed with antisemitic messages.

Speaking to the media on Monday, police said they believed all those incidents had a "common source" with the caravan plot.

"The caravan job was orchestrated by the same individual or individuals that were orchestrating the Pearl incidents," said NSW Police deputy commissioner David Hudson.

Mr Hudson further noted, however, that "none of the individuals we have arrested during Pearl have displayed any form of antisemitic ideology."

"I think what these organised crime heads have done is play to vulnerabilities in the community," he later explained.

"Obviously there have been antisemitic attacks of a lower nature, and a lot of anger and angst in the community – we've seen that since October 7th, 2023... And I think these organised crime figures have taken an opportunity to play on the vulnerability of the Jewish community."