People in the quiet farmland suburb initially ‘didn’t really pay that much attention’ to the caravan now at the centre of a suspected antisemitic bomb plot
When residents of a sleepy semi-rural street in Sydney’s north-west spotted a caravan on the side of the road last year, some thought it was part of a council cleanup.
Others later hypothesised the vehicle had been stolen and abandoned, or was home to a squatter.
Then the bomb squad arrived.
On Wednesday, the caravan was revealed to be at the centre of a suspected antisemitic bomb plot, with New South Wales police saying the van contained a list of Jewish targets and enough explosives to create a 40-metre blast zone.
“Nothing like this happens here,” one resident, who asked not to be named, told Guardian Australia. “The most you see is a dead kangaroo.”
Dural, a quiet farmland suburb of about 8,000 residents on Sydney’s fringe, is home to a large number of affluent families and retirees. More than 80% of the community own their house outright or with a mortgage.
Many of its grand homes are set on large acres with artificial water features, only accessible behind high gates fixed with intercoms.
On Thursday, NSW deputy police commissioner David Hudson told reporters a resident had first seen the caravan parked on the side of the road on 7 December. Believing it to be a hazard, he had towed it on to his property in Dural.
Hudson said on 19 January – six weeks after towing it on to his property – the resident had decided to open the caravan and found the explosives inside.
“Our investigation is looking at whether the caravan and its contents are acts in preparation for a terrorism event,” Hudson said, adding the resident who towed the caravan was a “witness”, not a person of interest.
“There were searches conducted in relation to the recovery to the caravan at a number of properties.”
Robert, the landlord of two houses near where the caravan was first parked who did not wish to use his surname, said he had passed the caravan, which was tucked in an enclave next to his house, “two or three times”. He “didn’t know why it was sitting there” and assumed it was part of a council cleanup.
Robert alleged his block of land, which is tenanted to two elderly women and a son with a disability, was subject to a raid without notice on 21 January by about 20 Australian federal police and a terrorist squad.
“They smashed all the doors down,” he said. “[The son] was handcuffed and knocked around [before being released].”
“I fully understand terrorism is a terrible thing and especially … antisemitism, there’s nothing worse than that in Australia … [The caravan] was never, ever on the property, it was up the road … [The explosives] have no relation to us.”
Robert said a complaint had been lodged with his local member over the treatment of the residents. Asked if it was “frightening” to know explosives were sitting metres from his tenants, he replied: “What do you say to that?
“Someone pulls up outside your house with some explosives, would you be frightened?”
Guardian Australia contacted both Julian Leeser and Mark Hodges, the local members for the area, for comment. The AFP declined to comment.
Ante Topic lives opposite the property where the caravan was found by police. The site is unassuming – a brown brick house and a small dam, surrounded by a field of grass with horses, goats and sheep.
He initially saw the vehicle about 500 metres down the street in early December. A few weeks after that, he said it was moved out of the way in front of his neighbour’s property. Approximately two weeks ago, he said it was relocated again further on to the property, where it remained until the raid.
“I didn’t really pay that much attention to it,” Topic said. “I just thought someone was living out of it.”
Topic said his neighbourhood had always been “really quiet, really good”, but that had changed with the arrival of the caravan.
He recalled getting home on the Sunday evening and seeing two police cars before “big surveillance vans rocked up”.
“A bomb squad truck came and I went to bed, it was pretty late,” he said. “We couldn’t leave, the neighbours couldn’t go on to their property, it was all blocked off.
“Nothing like this has ever happened.”
Another resident, who wished to remain anonymous, only officially moved in to their house two days ago. He was also contacted by the police last week, but had little information to give them.
“It’s come as a surprise to us, all this strange stuff going on,” he said.
“We did see the caravan up the other side of the dam, supposedly it was on the street before that … we only ever saw it tucked into the shrub [on the property that it was moved to].
“It struck me when I first saw it – it was a big van, an expensive looking van … and it wasn’t parked like you’d park a van, it was all tilted to one side, and padlocked.”
The registered owner of the caravan was in custody at the time it was located based on “peripheral” matters to the investigations, NSW police have confirmed. Two further arrests have been made “on the periphery” of the incident. No one has been charged in relation to the explosives found in the caravan.
