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Series Code: TIJ
Program Code: TIJ005105S
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00:33 This is the full-size replica of perhaps the most famous
00:38 Ice Cream cart in the world. 00:39 One that was used in the first terrorist attack ever 00:43 carried out in Australia. 00:45 On New Year's Day 1915, Badsha Mahommed Gool prepared 00:52 His Ice Cream Cart for its customary foray into the nearby 00:56 town of Broken Hill. Gool's was a familiar fixture around 01:01 town. And locals thought little of it when he wheeled his way 01:06 among them on that sweltering summer day. 01:09 The cart carried a small home- made flag, limp in the stale 01:14 humid air. The flag, a sun- bleached red with a crescent 01:19 and the star on it represented the Ottoman Empire, a state that 01:24 Gool had fought for as a soldier. On that particular 01:27 January day Gool wasn't just transporting ice cream in his 01:32 cart. Its contents also included deadly weapons. 01:37 Beside him set another man, not as familiar as Gool but 01:42 also a Broken Hill resident none-the-less. 01:45 The man Mullah Abdullah was a local Imam in Pallah Butcha 01:50 driving the cart a short distance outside of town, 01:54 they rolled to a stop along a deserted stretch of road 01:58 not far from the train tracks. 02:00 Leaving the cart behind Gool and Abdullah walked to an 02:05 embankment about 30 meters from the tracks where they 02:08 settled in to wait. 02:10 Around the corner having just passed through Broken Hill 02:14 the local Silverton train way train chugged into view. 02:19 The train was carrying passengers to the annual 02:23 New Year's Day Picnic in nearby Silverton. 02:26 About 1,200 picnickers were crammed into forty opened 02:31 ore trucks pulled along by a steam engine. As the train 02:36 neared their position, Gool and Abdullah pulled out two 02:39 rifles flipped onto their bellies, and opened fire on the 02:43 train. They got off a total of about 30 shots, at first the 02:49 picnickers thought the shots were part of their outing. 02:52 Perhaps a gun salute to hail their passing train, 02:56 or a staged fight or even target practice with blanks 03:01 instead of live rounds. 03:03 Their relation was short- lived however when they saw 03:08 other passengers on board the train jerking and falling 03:11 to the ground blood beneath their bodies as the bullets 03:15 found their marks. 03:18 In the ensuing panic, Gool and Abdullah calmly rose from 03:22 their positions made their way back to the Ice Cream cart 03:26 and high-tailed it towards home. They had just engineered and 03:31 spear-headed the first terrorist attack on Australian soil 03:36 while the country was in the thick of World War I. 03:39 This week, we'll take a look at not only the Broken Hill 03:44 terror attack but a handful of other terror attacks 03:47 throughout history. 03:49 What is the common thread that binds them all 03:54 and how can we find peace in the midst of the turmoil 03:57 we live in? Join me as we embark on yet another 04:02 Incredible Journey. 04:25 On the first of January 1915 1,200 men, women, and children 04:32 boarded the Silverton Tramway Company train consisting of a 04:37 Y-12 locomotive and 40 open ore trucks to travel to 04:43 Silverton for their annual New Year's Day picnic. 04:46 The crowded train of excited people departed Sulphide Street 04:52 Station at 10:00 a.m. Shortly after the departure about 1 km 05:00 down the track, the train and its passengers were ambushed 05:04 and attacked by Badsha Gool and Mullah Abdulla who fired 05:09 shots from near their Ice Cream Cart on which the Turkish flag 05:13 was attached. 05:15 When Gool and Abdullah opened fire on the train of 05:18 unsuspecting picnickers on that New Year's Day 1915 05:23 they were hoping for casualties. They aimed to kill, 05:27 they didn't just spray the train with a hail of bullets, 05:31 as a warning but as a calculated assault. 05:35 One of the bullets smashed into 17-year-old Alma Cowie's 05:40 head, killing her instantly. She slumped against her 05:44 boyfriend Carrie O'Brien who watched in growing horror 05:48 as her blood pooled over him. 05:50 Alma Cowie wasn't the only one shot, William John Shaw a 05:56 foreman in the Sanitary Department was also killed. 06:00 While his daughter Lucy Shaw was injured, six other people 06:05 on the train were injured as well. 06:07 The conductor on the train "Tiger" Dick Nyholm 06:11 happened to be a crack shot whipping out his rifle 06:15 he returned fire on Gool and Abdulla and proved to be 06:19 instrumental in protecting the trains passengers from 06:24 further harm. 06:25 The victims of the Broken Hill train shooting were the first 06:31 to fall in an act of terrorism perpetrated on home soil. 06:36 They were also the first Australian casualties 06:40 to fall on home soil under attack from an enemy 06:43 during World War I. The unexpected and vicious attack 06:48 captured the attention of the nation and the soldiers 06:52 who were fighting overseas? 06:54 In an aggressive move then Attorney Billy Hughes called for 07:00 the internment of all enemy nationals. 07:03 One young Victorian Anzac stationed overseas 07:07 wrote to the people of Broken Hill telling them 07:18 The Gallipoli landing still lay ahead and thought on that 07:23 New Year's Day the war was far away from Broken Hill 07:26 it left a calling card in the sleepy back town all the same. 07:32 When Goola and Abdullah planned their attack they chose a 07:37 prime location. The area around the stretch of track 07:41 they ambushed had little cover. Forty years of mining had 07:46 cleared the saltbush and the trees to be used as firewood. 07:50 They had also chosen the perfect target, the Manchester 07:54 Unit Picnic was an annual event and that year they were 07:58 picnicking in Silverton. The 1,200 residents who 08:03 clamored into the freshly swept ore trucks fitted with 08:07 benches were sitting ducks in the open carriages. 08:11 When the attack ended and the dust settled, there were 08:15 ten casualties, four of them died. In the ensuing panic 08:20 some of the adults flung them- selves protectively across 08:24 children while others jumped off the slow-moving carriages 08:28 and bolted for safety. 08:29 As the train with its screaming and traumatized passengers 08:34 drifted out of sight, Gool and Abdulla grabbed up their 08:39 weapons and ran. 08:41 They were armed with an ancient martini henry breech loading 08:46 rifle, a Snyder Enfield Carbine, a revolver and a homemade 08:51 bullet pouch. 08:52 The death and carnage caused by the two terrorists 08:57 and their weapons is remembered today by one of the open ore 09:01 railway wagons that stand at the ambush site. 09:04 From here Gool and Abdulla set out on their escape beat 09:10 They headed for this small course outcrop is known today as 09:15 White Rocks Reserve located about 2 km away. Gool and 09:21 Abdulla's attack was born out of misplaced nationalism 09:25 and religious zeal. 09:26 At the time of the attack Broken Hill was a mining town that had 09:32 basically been built on the backs of camels. Camels were 09:36 cheaper by far than bullets and cameleers, the handlers 09:40 and drivers were a common sight in the outback. However despite 09:44 the huge demand for their services cameleers were an 09:48 ostracized group. Though British subjects, they were denied union 09:53 membership and confined to camel camps on the outskirts 09:55 of town with their animals. 09:59 Local newspapers ran angry articles calling for the 10:04 expulsion of what they labeled the Afghan menace and there was 10:09 decided undercurrent of animosity towards cameleers 10:13 and Afghan's in general. 10:15 By 1915 Broken Hill had become a township built in its 10:20 lucrative lead, zinc, and silver mines, but it was also 10:25 a town that was isolated and somewhat wary about outsiders 10:30 both Abdulla and Gool had been subjected to a handful of 10:35 attacks against them which were mostly based on their 10:38 ethnicity. However despite the animosity, neither man was 10:44 know to have retaliated against such a tax in the past. 10:47 The Sydney Morning Herald reported a case 10:51 where children had thrown stones at Abdulla because he was 10:54 a cameleer. But other than complaining to the police, 10:59 he had done little else. 11:01 Bachad Mohamad Gool was born around 1874 in what is now 11:07 Afghanistan, he came to Australia as a cameleer and then 11:12 shortly after federation traveled to Turkey to fight 11:16 for the Ottoman Empire Army. After his brief stint in the army 11:21 Gool returned to Australia and took up working in the mines 11:26 but when mineral prices bottomed out during the war 11:30 and work in the mines dwindled he took to hawking? ice cream 11:34 from a cart. 11:36 Mullah Abdulla was born in 1855 near the famous Khyber Pass 11:41 in the province of modern-day Pakistan, sitting on the border 11:45 with Afghanistan. After migrating to Australia, he found work 11:50 as the Imam in Halibutcha for the Broken Hill camel camp. 11:55 The Broken Hill attack was a combination of Nationalism 12:00 and religious zeal fueled up by pent-up frustration over 12:04 personal circumstances and discriminatory treatment 12:08 that both men experience. For example, just days before 12:12 the picnic train attack, Abdullah had been fined 12:17 for killing sheep off licensed premises by a council sentry 12:21 officer. Interestingly, one of the victims of the train attack 12:26 was the foreman of the sanitary department William Shore. 12:31 Gool and Abdullah's attack against innocent unarmed 12:35 civilians out for a day of fun in the sun was not only 12:40 an appalling violent crime it was also unconscionable. 12:44 And while violence and hate are never an appropriate response 12:49 their actions are rooted in a far deeper overarching issue. 12:54 As human beings we are inherently weary of 12:58 anything that is not in keeping with our own cultural ideologies 13:02 and values that wearing us can turn into an animosity 13:07 and a sense of condescension, especially when we feel that 13:12 those who are not like us are also beneath us. 13:16 Racism is not just the matter the color of someone's skin 13:21 though that often does play a role. Racism is a hatred 13:26 against anything that is dissimilar to what we are 13:29 accustomed to and the root of racism is not so much an issue 13:34 of skin as it is the universal problem of sin that we're 13:39 all afflicted by. You've probably heard the saying... 13:48 Once Gool and Abdullah's attack ended, 13:50 panic broke out. On their way back to their camp Gool and 13:55 Abdullah killed another man Alfred E. Miller before making 14:00 their way back home. 14:01 Meanwhile, the train had pulled over deciding and the 14:05 police were contacted, the police in turn contacted the 14:09 local military base and a small force of police and local 14:12 the militia were mustered. They launched a search for 14:16 the attackers and encountered them in the area near the 14:21 Cable Hotel. The pair opened fire on the authorities wounding 14:25 one of the police officers. Gool and Abdullah then took 14:30 shelter behind this outcropping of wide ports and settled in 14:35 for a protracted siege. A three-hour gun battle followed 14:39 during which armed civilians came to the aide of the military 14:43 and law enforcement. 14:45 Towards the end of the battle only a thin stream of gunfire 14:50 came from Gool and Abdullah's hiding place. Police surmised 14:55 that one of them was most likely dead while the other was 14:58 wounded. A local man James Craig who lived behind the Cable Hotel 15:05 went out to chop wood during the gun battle and was hit 15:08 by a stray bullet, he became the fourth person to die 15:13 that day. Around 1:00 in the afternoon, law enforcement 15:18 and military personnel decided to storm Gool and Abdullah's 15:23 shelter. An eyewitness later afforded that Gool had stood up 15:28 but was gunned down. A note found on Gool's body 15:32 stated that he was a subject of the Ottoman Sultan 15:36 and that he was compelled to carry out the attack 15:40 in the name of his faith. Abdullah's note stated 15:44 much the same with a side note about his hatred 15:48 for the Chief Sanitary inspector who had fined him and him 15:52 and his intention to kill him first. 15:55 Turkish sources later claimed that the letters were planted 15:59 and the incident was pinned on the Turks to rally the 16:03 Australian public for the war effort. 16:05 In retaliation against the attack, local mobs converged 16:11 on migrant establishments attributing the actions of 16:14 Gool and Abdullah to be representative of what they 16:19 believed to be enemy aliens. On the evening of the attack 16:24 a German club in Broken Hill was attacked and burnt to the 16:27 ground. The incensed mob went so far as to cut the hoses 16:33 of the firemen who came to fight the flames ensuring that 16:37 the club could not be spared. The mob then marched to a 16:42 nearby camp of Afghan camel drivers but was prevented 16:46 from attacking the settlement by the police and military 16:49 performed a protective barrier between them and the terrified 16:51 inhabitants of the camp. 16:55 The next day the mines in Broken Hill fired all immigrant 17:01 employees categorized as enemy aliens under the 17:06 1914 Commonwealth War Precautions Act. 17:07 Simultaneously seeks Austrians, four Germans, and one Turk 17:16 were ordered to leave Broken Hill by the enraged 17:19 local community. Not long after all migrants who were deemed 17:25 to be a threat to National Security during wartime 17:29 in Australia were interred in camps for the duration of 17:33 the war. 17:34 The story of the attack at Broken Hill raises a multitude 17:39 of questions four most among them is this. 17:42 Do the actions of a handful of individuals represent the 17:47 actions and ideology of the entire community they belong to? 17:52 Did the actions of the two camel drivers represent the feelings 17:58 of the entire Afghan community in Australia? 18:01 Did they represent the feeling of the entire German and 18:04 Austrian community in Australia? 18:07 And did the racially motivated discrimination that many Afghan 18:12 cameleers faced represent the sentiments of the entire 18:16 population of Broken Hill? 18:18 Well, the answer to these questions is an obvious NO! 18:23 The actions of a handful of individuals don't represent 18:27 the community or ethnic group they belong to 18:31 but in many cases, as human beings. it's easy for us to 18:36 lump people together under a single banner and pigeonhole 18:40 them based on the actions of people who look or speak 18:44 like them. More often than not racism and discrimination 18:50 are not so much a matter of skin as of sin. 18:55 Even though in some instances skin plays a part. 18:59 On a great many occasions discrimination and racial 19:03 prejudice has nothing to do with the color of one's skin. 19:07 In 1994 over a period of roughly of 100 days 19:12 members of the Tutsi Minority was slaughtered without remorse 19:17 by members of the armed Tutu Mission in Rwanda. 19:20 It was one of the bloodiest instances of genocide 19:24 the world has ever seen. 19:26 Estimates place the death toll of the genocide between 500,000 19:32 and 800,000 Tutsis. The Rwandan genocide 19:34 was racially motivated but had nothing to do with skin color 19:41 it had its basis in tribal violence and ethnic prejudice. 19:47 Similarly in Sri Lanka in 1983 ethnic tensions led to a brutal 19:54 killing spree of civilians. Dubbed black July the 1983 19:59 riots were triggered by a Tamil Militant Group killing 20:03 thirteen Sri Lankan Army soldiers. 20:06 In response anti-Tamil riots took place on the night of 20:11 the 24th of July in the capital city of Columba and continued 20:16 over a period of seven days where Sinhalese mobs 20:20 attacked, looted, burned, and killed Tamil targets 20:24 The death toll climbed into the thousands and over 100,000 20:30 people were displaced and had to flee their homes. 20:33 Again, like the Rwandan Genocide, the Sri Lankan riots 20:39 were based solely on ethnicity. 20:42 Another stark and universally known instance of genocide 20:46 is Hitler's treatment of the Jews during World-War II. 20:50 An estimated six million Jews were murdered by the Nazis 20:55 during the Holocaust and other un-numbered were brutalized. 20:58 The common thread that weaves through all these narratives 21:03 is this. When on racial, ethnic, or religious group feels 21:08 superior to another the result is always discrimination and 21:13 violence. It's not just a story of racism, but a story of 21:18 human pride gone rogue. 21:21 The sad reality is that as human beings, we are all steeped 21:27 in a disease that the Bible calls sin. Sin is best described 21:33 in Isaiah 14:13, 14 where the Bible explains the fall of 21:40 Lucifer and the attitude he cherished in his heart 21:43 that led to his fall. Here's what it says. 22:10 You see, the root cause of sin is pride. Did you notice that 22:15 Lucifer had an I problem. I, I, I. The kind of pride that 22:23 leaves us to believe we are better than someone else 22:26 simply because of the way we look, think, act, or talk 22:30 or even because of what we believe. It's this kind of pride 22:35 that leads to racism, discrimination, and the kind 22:39 of nationalism that can lead to acts of violence and 22:43 terrorism. And this kind of pride is not something that 22:47 is not isolated to a single demographic of people. 22:51 This kind of pride is engrained in every human heart. 22:56 because the Bible says in Romans 3:23. 23:12 others but the Bible tells us plainly that there is no room 23:17 for this kind of pride. In fact, racism in all its forms 23:23 be it discrimination against someone because of the color 23:27 of their skin or their ethnicity or their beliefs is something 23:32 the Bible always denounces. 23:35 In Galatians 3:28, the Bible says. 23:52 You see, the Bible teaches us that we are not to discriminate 23:58 between ethnic groups, cultural ideologies or social status. 24:03 The ground is level at the foot of the cross and we are 24:09 to treat each other accordingly without discrimination, hate, 24:13 or bigotry. Each of us has been created in the image of God 24:18 and saved by the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross, 24:22 it is this alone that gives us value. 24:25 Though we form different nations speak different languages, 24:30 and have different cultural values, the Bible tells us 24:34 that God has made us of one blood. There is no room for 24:39 discrimination in God's sight, we are all His children, 24:43 all equally valued in His sight. 24:48 The good news of Jesus' life, death and resurrection is a 24:52 message that is applicable to the entire human race 24:56 and must be shared with all. God wants us to understand that 25:01 in His eyes, we are all equal, none of us is better than 25:06 the other. The desire to exalt ourselves above someone else 25:11 is a result of sin and it is a malady that plagues all of us. 25:16 The truth is no demographic is more racist or discriminatory 25:22 than any other. All of us given the right conditions have within 25:28 us the capacity to be racist. This is exactly why we need 25:33 the good news of salvation. It is through Jesus alone 25:38 that we can choose to treat each other with the kindness 25:42 dignity and respect we all deserve. 25:45 It is through Jesus alone that we can value each other 25:49 without consideration of race, social standing, religion, 25:55 or ethnic background. The Biblical account of creation 26:00 and salvation places us all on an equal footing and makes us 26:05 all sons and daughters of God, heir's to the promise of 26:10 eternal life through Jesus Christ and the hope that He 26:13 gives us for true transformation of character. 26:18 Jesus offers us all the opportunity for transformation 26:23 He gives us the opportunity to look at each other 26:27 through His eyes to see human beings made in the image of God 26:32 inherently valuable because they are God's children. 26:38 If you'd like to find out more about God's unconditional love 26:41 for us and His plans for a future where peace, love, 26:45 and joy will reign supreme then I'd like to recommend 26:50 a free gift we have for all our Incredible Journey viewers 26:54 today. It's the booklet Seeing Through God's Eyes. 27:00 This booklet is our gift to you and is absolutely free, 27:04 there are no costs of obligations what-so-ever. 27:08 So, make the most of this wonderful opportunity 27:12 to receive the free gift we have for you today. 27:15 Phone or text us at 27:23 or 020.422.2042 in New Zealand or visit our website at TiJ.tv 27:32 to request today's free offer. and we'll send it to you 27:35 totally free of charge and with no obligation. 27:38 Write to us at GPO Box 274 Sydney NSW 2001, Australia 27:45 or P.O. Box 76673 Manukau Auckland 2241 New Zealand. 27:52 Don't delay call or text us now. 27:56 Dear Heavenly Father, We thank you that in Jesus 28:02 we are all part of one great family regardless of our 28:06 language, color, or religion. Lord, help us to see others 28:11 through your eyes and to treat all with love, kindness, respect 28:16 and dignity. We ask this in Jesus name. 28:19 Amen |
Revised 2022-08-30