logo
Police investigate anti-Israel video threatening Lovitt Technologies

Police investigate anti-Israel video threatening Lovitt Technologies

Herald Sun14-07-2025
Don't miss out on the headlines from Social. Followed categories will be added to My News.
A disturbing video is circulating across social media that appears to threaten violence against Australians working at aerospace company Lovitt Technologies.
The unverified video shows a person speaking in a digitally altered voice and dressed completely in black.
The person calls the message 'an anonymous communique' from the 'cell' that torched and vandalised three cars on the Lovitt lot in Melbourne on July 5.
CCTV of the incident shows five hooded offenders entering the business just before 4am, setting fire to the cars.
In the video, the person says the vandalism was not 'an accident'.
'This is a clear and serious threat,' the person says.
'If you continue making weapons or components of any kind there will be consequences. Consider this a warning.'
The person then reveals anti-Israel, anti-American and anti-Australian sentiment underpins the group's actions.
'After 21 months of an accelerated genocide against the Palestinian people by the illegitimate Zionist entity, eight decades of American warmongering and imperialism, 2½ centuries of the most violent colonial oppression, ethnic cleansing and murder of Aboriginal peoples across so-called Australia, Lovitt Technologies has chosen its place at the intersection of these catastrophes,' the person says.
The unverified video shows a person clad all in black and talking in a digitally altered voice. The person threatens employees of Australian aerospace company Lovitt Technologies. Picture: Supplied
The group is targeting Lovitt because it supplies components to defence and aerospace companies Lockheed Martin, BAE and Boeing, the person says.
The person then threatens violence against the company's workers and suggests his group has been 'watching' Lovitt's employees and collecting personal information on them.
'Every worker in this supply chain is complicit,' the person says.
'You have had years to contemplate the consequences of your actions. We will decide your fate as you have decided the fate of millions.
'For the past few months, we have been closely watching you. We have your addresses. All the information we have about you will be distributed to our underground networks. Stop arming Israel or else.'
The person ends the video by saying 'every colony will burn'.
'Death to Israel. Death to Australia. Death to America. From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free,' they say.
Victoria Police has confirmed it is investigating the July 5 attack and now the video.
'The matter is now being investigated by the Victorian Joint Counter Terrorism Team, which includes personnel from Victoria Police, the Australian Federal Police and the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation,' a Victoria Police spokeswoman told NewsWire on Monday.
'Investigators are aware of a video which has been circulating where a group has claimed responsibility for the incident.
'This video is being reviewed as part of the ongoing investigation.
'Police have already released CCTV of five people they would like to speak to in relation to the incident. Each person was dressed in black hooded jumpers, backpacks and gloves.'
Police said there were as yet no links between the July 5 act of vandalism at Lovitt and other criminal acts that hit Melbourne over that weekend, including the arson attack on the East Melbourne Hebrew Congregation synagogue.
Police say there is at this time no link between the arson attack on the East Melbourne Hebrew Congregation synagogue and the group that attacked Lovitt Technologies on July 5. Picture: NewsWire / Valeriu Campan
Executive Council of Australian Jewry co-chief executive Alex Ryvchin said the group's video and message resembled 'an al-Qaeda terror cell'.
'It doesn't matter that they think they're doing something just and righteous – Islamist terrorists and neo-Nazis think that too,' he told NewsWire.
'What matters is that we remain a country of laws and not allow bands of zealots to decide what is a legitimate target for violence and criminal acts.
'Today it is a business they oppose and tomorrow it will be individuals, politicians, journalists or religious institutions they deem impure.
'We expect this incident to be investigated and for those responsible to be met with the law.'
NewsWire contacted Lovitt, but the company has declined to comment.
Originally published as Video shows underground anti-Israel group threatening violence against Lovitt Technologies
Orange background

Try Our AI Features

Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:

Comments

No comments yet...

Related Articles

NT government expands role of G4S private security guards to support overcrowded watch houses
NT government expands role of G4S private security guards to support overcrowded watch houses

ABC News

time3 hours ago

  • ABC News

NT government expands role of G4S private security guards to support overcrowded watch houses

In an expansion of private prison staff responsibilities in the Northern Territory, Department of Corrections employees have heard the duties performed by private security firm G4S will be increased. In March, the NT government signed a six-month contract with G4S to manage the transfer of Darwin prisoners. G4S security guards currently help to transfer inmates between prisons and the courts, as territory correctional staff face record prisoner numbers. Despite a recruitment drive for 202 new corrections officers to be employed inside prisons this financial year, NT Corrections Minister Gerard Maley has previously acknowledged the prison population is growing and that the government needs to expand the workforce. In an internal memo seen by the ABC, corrections staff were told Corrections Commissioner Matthew Varley had signed a work order to expand the duties carried out by private security guards. "As we shape this next phase, we are working closely with G4S to determine what a Northern Territory-based G4S staffing model could look like." The United Workers Union (UWU), which represents corrections officers, has been strongly opposed to the NT's six-month arrangement with G4S since it began in March. UWU NT branch secretary Erina Early said although G4S guards had been assisting with prison transfers since that time, corrections staff had not seen any improvement to their working conditions. "It hasn't made much change to our correctional officers at all because the [prisoner] numbers are increasing," she said. "Bringing in G4S may relieve a couple of shifts, but it's not having the outcome that the government [is] hoping for." Ms Early said union members were worried for "the safety of the prisoners and also safety of the police" — who have a different skillset to correctional officers — and held concerns the expansion of G4S's services signalled growing privatisation in the NT's corrections system. "They've been saying this since it was announced by Commissioner Matthew Varley, that G4S were coming in — as soon as you have them in, it's like a cancer, they will spread," she said. "They have been taking more and more roles." Corrections Minister Gerard Maley last month told the ABC that privatising the entire NT prison system was not on the government's radar. "There are private firms that run prisons in their entirety, that's not our plan at all," he said. "Our plan is to make sure that we have highly trained officers behind the wire, and then independent contractors such as G4S doing the services outside that." The NT's corrections department has been housing a growing number of prisoners in police watch houses in recent months, due to capacity constraints at territory prisons. Earlier this week, there were about 100 people being held inside the Palmerston police watch house, including overflow corrections prisoners. G4S is part of American private security giant Allied Universal, which employs more than 800,000 people internationally and generates about $20 billion in annual revenue. The company describes itself as a "global leader in security". Security guards employed by G4S in Australia mainly work in prisons and detention centres. The firm has operated Victoria's largest maximum security prison, Port Phillip Prison, since it opened in 1997. A 2018 report by the Victorian auditor-general's office found "serious incidents" at Port Phillip Prison, including assaults and drug use, and "exposed weaknesses in how G4S … manage safety and security risks". A Victorian coroner recently recommended G4S improve staff training following the "preventable" 2022 death of an Aboriginal man in his prison cell. Port Phillip Prison is due to close by the end of this year. Last year, G4S reached a confidential settlement with the parents of an Iranian asylum seeker, who was fatally bashed by guards at a Manus Island offshore detention centre in 2014. The company was also fined over its role in the death of an Aboriginal elder, who overheated in the back of a prison van in remote Western Australia in 2008. It is not yet clear how much the NT government's contract with G4S has cost the public.

Man jailed for 15 years after repeatedly raping seven-year-old girl at wife's daycare centre in Point Cook, Victoria
Man jailed for 15 years after repeatedly raping seven-year-old girl at wife's daycare centre in Point Cook, Victoria

7NEWS

time3 hours ago

  • 7NEWS

Man jailed for 15 years after repeatedly raping seven-year-old girl at wife's daycare centre in Point Cook, Victoria

WARNING: Confronting content The husband of a daycare owner has been sentenced to 15 years in prison for repeatedly raping a seven-year-old girl at his wife's centre. The now 50-year-old offender was found guilty of repeatedly sexually assaulting the child between February 2021 and August 2022 at their home-turned centre in Point Cook, southwest of Melbourne. The girl had been attending the centre since she was two years old. The offences took place in the lounge room during the day, while she was in after-school care and on weekends. The abuse came to light in November 2022, when the girl complained to her older sister she was experiencing pain in her genital area. She was taken to a doctor the following day and disclosed what had happened. Following the consultation, she was then referred to the Royal Children's Hospital, and Victoria Police were contacted. In her police interview, the girl said she felt 'scared' and 'tricked' by the man, who would 'ask if she liked it and had a weird smile'. Police obtained CCTV footage from the lounge room, but no recordings from the period when the offences occurred had been retained. Since the offending, the young girl suffers from nightmares, is afraid of the dark, and insists on having a camera in her room for a sense of safety, the Herald Sun reported. She also continues to experience difficulties at school. Her mother told the court she now lives in a constant state of guilt and emotional pain. 'I blame myself for what happened … The anxiety, the helplessness, the fear that I failed her is like running a marathon I never signed up for. And it never ends,' said the mother, according to the Herald Sun. 'These are not things a child should ever have to worry about or fear.' The masthead reported the offender emigrated from the Philippines in 2002. It remains unclear whether he held a Working With Children Check, how many other children were enrolled at the centre, and if their families have been informed. Judge Harper described the man's actions as 'abhorrent'. 'Your victim was only seven years of age. Your actions were abhorrent and as conceded by your counsel, the offending was humiliating, demeaning and objectifying,' she said. 'You breached the trust of your victim and her family and led her to believe your wife knew of the offending so it was alright. 'Your offending was opportunistic, committed on occasions where your wife was not in the vicinity.' He was sentenced to a total of 15 years and six months in prison, with a non-parole period of nine years and nine months. He must complete a sex offenders treatment program and will remain on the sex offenders register for life. A Department of Education spokesperson said the family daycare has been banned to eliminate further risk to children's safety.

Primary school students targeted by anti-Semitic chants
Primary school students targeted by anti-Semitic chants

Perth Now

time4 hours ago

  • Perth Now

Primary school students targeted by anti-Semitic chants

A state education minister has offered support to a leading Jewish school after a group of 10 and 11 year-old students was allegedly subjected to anti-Semitic taunts. Melbourne's Mount Scopus Memorial College said a group of grade five children were targeted with intimidating slurs "on the basis of their visible Jewish identity". The school alleged the taunts came from students from a different, unnamed high school during an excursion to Melbourne Museum on Thursday. A man who identified himself as a grandfather of one of the primary students said his granddaughter was left "totally traumatised". "She had no understanding why she was told she was a baby killer, why she was told she was a dirty Jew," the man told Melbourne radio station 3AW. Mount Scopus Memorial College principal Dan Sztrajt said the incident was distressing and is being investigated. "No child should ever be made to feel unsafe or targeted because of their identity or background," he said. Mr Sztrajt did not name the other school allegedly involved but said the other principal had expressed concern. "Mount Scopus Memorial College has offered to work together with the other school to ensure that an appropriate educational to this incident is made available," he said. Melbourne Museum operator Museums Victoria said discrimination had no place in its facilities. "Museums Victoria is deeply sorry that this incident has occurred at one of our venues," it said. Victorian Education Minister and Deputy Premier Ben Carroll said he had spoken to Mr Sztrajt to convey his "disgust" at the attack on the students and offer every support possible. "It is unacceptable that students or staff feel unsafe in the community where they learn, work and play," he said in a statement. Cabinet minister Danny Pearson said he did not believe anti-Semitism had become a "norm" for Jewish Melburnians. "If you look around our city and our state, the overwhelming majority of people are tolerant, respectful," he told reporters on Friday. "They're not racist, they're not bigots." Asked if the state government had done enough to stamp out the behaviour, Mr Pearson noted it passed legislation through parliament in April to strengthen Victoria's anti-vilification laws. The criminal aspect of the changes, which make it easier to prove serious vilification in public, private or online, take effect on September 20. Victoria Police were contacted for comment.

DOWNLOAD THE APP

Get Started Now: Download the App

Ready to dive into a world of global content with local flavor? Download Daily8 app today from your preferred app store and start exploring.
app-storeplay-store