MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — An Australian state committed more police to investigate a spate of antisemitic crimes, officials said on Tuesday after a childcare center was torched near a Sydney synagogue.

The explosives located in a caravan could have caused a 'potential mass casualty event', authorities have said.

Australian police believe explosives found on Sydney’s outskirts were evidence of a deadly escalation in a campaign of antisemitic arson and graffiti crimes that has been waged in major cities for months.

SYDNEY: Australian authorities said Wednesday (j=Jan 29) they had seized explosives stored in a caravan in greater Sydney possibly intended for a "mass casualty" anti-Semitic attack.

Chris Minns, the premier of New South Wales, emphasized that the operation targeting these antisemitic crimes is “just getting started.”

and one person suffered burn injuries in the fire that was set at a Melbourne synagogue in December. Acting New South Police Wales Police Commissioner Peter Thurtell said Strike Force Pearl ...

Caravan in outer suburban Sydney contained industrial explosives and notes listing 'Jewish entities' Australian police were Thursday investigating if explosives stashed in an abandoned caravan outside Sydney were part of a planned "terrorism event" targeting Jewish residents.

Australian authorities say they are investigating links to overseas actors as they crack down on antisemitic violence.

Australian police say they suspect explosives stashed on Sydney’s outskirts were evidence of a deadly escalation in a campaign of antisemitic arson and graffiti crimes that has been waged in major cities for months.

Australia has been grappling with a spate of antisemitic attacks on synagogues, buildings and cars since the beginning of the Israel-Gaza war in late 2023.

Sydney restaurateur Judith Lewis couldn’t save the mezuzah, a framed parchment inked with Hebrew prayers, that was hanging in her family’s café when arsonists set it alight in the early hours one Sunday in late October.

The police have offered no evidence of any connection between recent arson and graffiti attacks and the mass opposition to the Australian government-backed Israeli genocide in Gaza.