Multiple cars torched hours after ‘brazen' daylight shooting in Sydney shopping strip

Sydney Morning Herald

16-06-2025

Authorities have vowed to throw as many resources 'as humanly possible' at the investigation into the attack at an Auburn restaurant – which NSW Premier Chris Minns labelled 'shockingly brazen' – as the number of underworld-linked shootings climbs.
The months-long conflict reached new heights on Monday, when two masked gunmen stormed into the M Brothers Family Restaurant on Auburn Road and opened fire on Azari, 26, shooting a female shop employee twice during the attempted assassination just after 1pm.
Azari, who police allege has climbed the ranks of the Alameddine network to become one of its most senior members not to have fled overseas or be serving a lengthy prison sentence, was shot in the arm and shoulder, surviving the third attempt on his life in the past four months.
Another man, an associate of Azari, was shot in the face, while the 50-year-old employee suffered two gunshot wounds to her torso.
Azari, and the woman, not believed to be linked to the gangland figure, were taken to hospital in a stable condition, while Azari's associate remains in a serious condition. Nine reports that the woman is expected to make a full recovery.
'It's beyond comprehension that three people be shot in a crowded Sydney street in broad daylight,' Acting Police Commissioner Peter Thurtell said on Monday afternoon.
Thurtell said the gunmen had tried to access an office inside the restaurant before fleeing the crime scene in a black Audi Q7 with cloned number plates.
The NSW premier declared that police were 'already hunting down those responsible'.
'We don't stand for it, and NSW Police doesn't stand for it,' Minns said.
'The NSW Police Force has levelled charges in relation to 20 of the 25 organised crime murders since 2021 and they're not done yet.
'People committing this kind of violence can expect to be arrested, charged and to spend years inside small jail cells.'
Monday's shooting was the second time in the past three weeks that would-be assassins have unsuccessfully tried to kill Azari after following him from a police station, where he is required to report as part of strict bail conditions.
Azari, who survived assassination attempts in February and May, had reported to Auburn police station an hour before being shot, and had raised concerns about another possible attempt on his life as recently as Friday, Thurtell said.
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'The fact that he was out again in public, I don't know what that says, to be honest, about what he was thinking,' Thurtell said.
Investigators from Taskforce Falcon, established to crack down on escalating gangland violence, are probing whether Monday's shooters are the same men who opened fire on Azari last month in Granville, killing Alameddine associate Dawwod Zakaria, 32, and injuring Parramatta lawyer Sylvan Singh, 25. Zakaria died in hospital several days after the shooting, which unfolded while the men were travelling in peak-hour traffic on Woodville Road.
A day after the assassination attempt, police warned Azari was at the 'epicentre' of an ongoing feud between the Alameddine clan and rival organised crime networks, and that he could be targeted as part of a 'tit-for-tat' gangland war if granted bail on firearms offences laid after the Granville shooting.
Opposing Azari's bail application last month, police prosecutor Kai Jiang said Azari had been targeted because of his 'connection and significant holding' in the Alameddine network.
'There will be further bloodshed on the streets – the streets will not be safe,' Jiang told Parramatta Local Court.
Jiang said Azari had 'taken up a senior role' in the Alameddine network and had started travelling with several bodyguards after the Brighton-Le-Sands shooting.
Thurtell said police held concerns a 'war' within the Alameddine network had 'imploded' and spilt onto Sydney's streets.
'It's outrageous that these people have now taken their fight to the streets of Sydney. This is not what we expect in this city,' he said.
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'Obviously, they're a violent organisation, and they're happy to target people that are outside their organisation or those, if necessary from within their own organisation.'
The ongoing conflict and recent shootings have sparked fears of attacks in the underworld, with several Alameddine members and associates taking measures to make themselves less predictable after earlier attempts on Azari's life.
Police Minister Yasmin Catley said it was 'appalling' that an innocent bystander had been injured in the shooting.
'A woman has been caught up in this event – an innocent victim doing her job,' Catley said.
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'It's one thing for criminals to be shooting each other, but when innocent people get caught up in this, it is absolutely abhorrent, and we will not tolerate it.'
Vowing to do 'everything we can to bring these gunmen to justice', Thurtell said Taskforce Falcon investigators would 'go and go and go'.
'It's completely unacceptable that this sort of behaviour should happen in Sydney,' Thurtell said.