On Tuesday morning, the New South Wales government declared that Monday's stabbing at a Sydney church was a terror act.
On Monday, April 16, a 16-year-old kid was arrested after a bishop, a priest, and churchgoers were assaulted during mass at Assyrian Christ The Good Shepherd Church.
At least four persons sustained "non-life-threatening" injuries, according to authorities. The attacker was also injured. Just after 7 p.m. local time, Bishop Mar Mari Emmanuel was giving a sermon.
The incident was filmed on a church livestream, causing immediate chaos in the Wakeley district. Police said that Father Isaac Royel had also been stabbed. Emmanuel and Royel were rushed to the hospital with non-life-threatening injuries.
Terror offences in Australia are defined by police as ideologically motivated.
Authorities have repeatedly declined to disclose the religion of the suspected perpetrator.
Graphic videos of the incident and its aftermath went viral on social media on Monday night, attracting an angry mob to the Assyrian Orthodox Church, which is roughly 35 kilometres south-west of the city centre.
Approximately 100 police officers and more than 30 police vehicles flooded the area, including specialist cops and a police aircraft.
The crowd, which numbered in the hundreds, battled aggressively with police officers who were guarding the church where the attacker was receiving medical treatment.
Two officers were injured, one with a broken jaw from being hit with a brick and fence palings, and ten police cars were smashed. Similarly, the violence left paramedics "holed up" inside the church for more than three hours, afraid about their safety.
In a personal letter on the Church's website, Emmanual states his duty to communicate the truth.
"In our time and age, we believe the most important and fundamental insight is coming into the truth," it goes on to say. "The world bombards the human race with so much information, quite often we lose our orientation in discerning the lie from the truth."
The bishop is in stable condition, according to a church statement issued this morning. It is reported that the religious leader had been threatened for two weeks prior to the attack.
Australia: Sydney church knife attack that left Bishop dead considered as terror act
