NEW SOUTH WALES POLICE STATE

Lightning Ridge Neighbourhood Centre Photograph John Stapleton

The world had been gripped by a collective madness. Bombs rained down in the Middle East, families ran terrified from a stadium in Manchester.
Politicians preached. 
The Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull pontificated about the evils of terrorism, as he himself, the man responsible for the 50, sometimes more than 100 bombs Australia was dropping on Iraq and Syria each month, grew more compromised by the hour. 
It showed in his narrowing face, greyed-out hair, in the blows to his normally bullying swagger.
In the cesspit which Sydney had become, and in which his type thrived, he wanted everyone to know he was rich, successful, his house worth more than $50 million a year.
Now he was a loser, down in the polls, his long standing success curdling in his veins, the people disillusioned, exasperated, praying as they themselves were preyed upon..
In his short stint as Prime Minister he had become one of the most unpopular people in the country. 
Like others before him, the man who had dreamt of becoming Prime Minister all his life had botched the job when he got there, failed to represent the people who had put him there; and now there was nothing to do but flail in an increasingly frustrated quagmire, sad, discontent, a sloven slave to intellectual fashion and bureaucratic bullying.
The thug at the top of a pile of thugs.
Old Alex had woken up muttering, "thermonuclear device".
Did Islamic State have one? Were they prepared to use it? 
Was Armageddon really upon us?
The bombs rained down, the stinking smell of burnt flesh.
What were they fighting for? What was there left to save? 
The primary subject of conversation at the dwindling Tables of Knowledge in the once rollicking town was the excessive zealotry of the police, in this town without a traffic light, in the middle of absolutely nowhere.
It was emblematic of what was happening to the country as a whole, the burden of regulation confronting everyone, urging reform on all the darkest horses emerging from the swamps. 
Just days before, the police had set up a mobile drug testing van, ensuring that the streets were particularly quiet that day, as word spread rapidly.
They had managed, in any case, he was told, to catch 32 people out for having smoked a joint.
More than 50 years after the 60s.
Almost three dozen people's lives destroyed in a single day. Excellent work chaps.
Australia was a backward looking country going rapidly backward, and the signs were everywhere. 
He was told, although he had heard it all before, of the police arresting people for leaving their windows wound down, in 50C heat, for leaving their shopping on the backseat, unsecured load.
And, new one on him, for having too much mud on their mud caps, in a place where dirt tracks riddled out across hundreds, ultimately thousands of square kilometres. 
It was an insanity.
In the short drive from the camp where he was staying outside Lightning Ridge he saw two police vehicles, in a distance of perhaps 1.5 kilometres. 
Exasperated, he looked up and begged: leave us alone. 
But in the totalitarian state that was now Australia, the ferociousness of the government control strung across a collapsing civic culture, that was never going to happen. 


THE BIGGER STORY:

http://www.iraqinews.com/iraq-war/coalition-airstrike-kills-dozens-islamic-state-members-west-anbar/

Anbar (IraqiNews.com) Dozens of Islamic State members were killed in an airstrike launched by the U.S.-led coalition, west of Anbar, a military source in the province said.

“The coalition jets shelled the IS tunnels and weapon stashes in Houran valley, west of Rutba town,” the source told AlSumaria News.

“The strikes left the tunnels and stashes destroyed and dozens of IS militants killed,” the source, who preferred anonymity, added.

Rutba is controlled by security troops, however, the town faces IS militants attacks every now and then that are being encountered by security.

Last week, an offensive was launched in the desert of Anbar leaving 34 militants killed. According to the War Media Cell, the operation was launched through thee axes including north of Qadisiya lake toward Rawa city, south of Euphrates River toward Rihana and Annah cities and another axis toward Makhazin Haditha and Valley of Houran.

Anbar’s western towns of Annah, Qaim and Rawa have been held by the extremist group since 2014, when it emerged to proclaim a self-styled Islamic Caliphate.

Fighter jets from the Iraqi army and the international coalition have also regularly pounded IS locations in the province. The Iraqi government is expected to aim at those strongholds once the Mosul battle is concluded.

http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/nsw/returned-jihadis-roaming-free-in-sydney-not-enough-evidence-to-have-them-jailed/news-story/06453ce90efca3fd1290cb510e71a339

ISLAMIC extremists returning from fighting in Iraq and Syria are roaming our streets as free men because frustrated authorities do not have enough evidence to put them behind bars.

Counter-terrorism experts have revealed authorities have used laws to prosecute returning foreign fighters on just two occasions. This is despite more than 40 people returning from war zones to Australia in the past five years.

The government has been thwarted in the war against terror because it is so hard to obtain evidence from Syrian and Iraqi authorities.

It comes as revelations about Manchester bomber Salman Abedi’s links to Syria continue to unfold — including information he had trained as a fighter in the country after visiting family in Libya.

Attorney-General George Brandis is refusing to say how many extremists have been prosecuted under returning foreign fighter legislation.

But Australian Strategic Policy Institute’s Counter Terrorism Policy Centre head Jacinta Carroll said only two returning extremists have been prosecuted. One of them was charged with fighting with al-Qaeda affiliate Jabhat al-Nusra at the end of last year.

“A second person was prosecuted in December 22 (last year). The only other use of the foreign fighters legislation was Hamdi Alqudsi’s prosecution for recruitment, but he didn’t leave Australia,” Ms Carroll said.