AUSTRALIA will now consider flags of Islamic terrorist groups to be the same as Nazi swastikas and will either jail or cancel visas of those who display them in public

Protesters who displayed the flags of terrorist group Hezbollah and allegedly chanted violent verses could be jailed for a year or have their visas cancelled and be deported after the federal government ordered a manhunt into weekend protests that sparked a firestorm over the limits of free speech.

SMH In one of the Albanese government’s toughest responses yet to extremist sentiment since the October 7 Hamas attacks, Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke demanded NSW and Victorian authorities check the visa status of demonstrators who are alleged to have glorified Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah, who was killed in an Israeli strike on Beirut on Saturday.

“I won’t hesitate to cancel the visas of visitors to our country who are spreading hate,” he said late on Monday after a day of political debate about Australia’s laws banning terror insignia and hate speech.

Federal police initially suggested the protests did not meet the threshold for an investigation, as Labor and Coalition MPs demanded action under new laws that ban the display of terror symbols if they are used to spread hate, intimidate or incite violence. Prosecutions would represent a high-profile national test case for the laws.

Late on Monday, the Australian Federal Police announced they would probe at least six incidences in which Melburnians paraded the flags of Hezbollah, the Lebanese militia designated a terrorist group in 2003, or shouted ancient chants considered antisemitic.

“People have to know that they are carrying a symbol that is prohibited. Generally speaking, we give them the opportunity to remove that symbol, and if they don’t, and they continue presenting that symbol in a public place, then they may have committed that offence,” Assistant Commissioner Peter McKenna said.

It has been a federal offence since January this year to display the symbol of a terrorist organisation in public, after laws were passed to crack down on the display of Nazi swastikas, Islamic State flags and other symbols of prohibited groups.

Coalition leader Peter Dutton said it was “unacceptable that the government wouldn’t be arresting people already”, adding that terrorist sympathisers had “no place in our country”.

Victorian premier Jacinta Allan said she expected police to pursue protesters, adding: “This is driving deep grief and division here on the streets of Melbourne.”

Liberal Senator Dave Sharma, a former Australian ambassador to Israel, said on Sky News he didn’t see “how any Jewish person could feel safe in Sydney or Melbourne’s CBD on Sunday”. The chants heard at the Melbourne rally refer to the historic battle of Khaybar in which Jews were massacred.