The Sydney doctor working to bring ISIS families home told western Sydney voters before the last election that re-electing Tony Burke was the “only hope” they had of seeing the 34 women and children back in Australia.
In an open letter published in the Sydney-based Middle East Times newspaper in April last year, Rifi urged voters in Burke’s electorate of Watson to reject a hardline pro-Palestinian independent campaign to unseat him.
Rifi ran the Friends of Tony Burke campaign, arguing if the home affairs minister lost his seat it would pave the way for former Liberal leader Peter Dutton to win the election. This would have eliminated the chance of the ISIS-affiliated families coming home, Rifi said.
“These children don’t know politics,” he said in the letter, published on April 7, 2025, a few weeks before the May election. “Their only hope is that if the Labor Party win government, they might one day return to safety and rebuild their lives.”
Facing scrutiny over the government’s management of the return of families from Syria, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Burke have claimed the government had a consistent policy to oppose the return of fighters’ relatives since an earlier repatriation in 2022 caused a political backlash.
Asked about the open letter, Rifi told this masthead it had been his hope at the time that Burke would help.
“The reality was I knew Peter Dutton would NEVER do it,” he said via messages from his current location in the Middle East. “I thought their chances are better with Labor … I do know now that I miscalculated.”
Opposition home affairs spokesman Jono Duniam argued the open letter was an alarming signal that confirmed “the widely held suspicions that Tony Burke had made it clear that Labor would try and pave the way for these people to come to Australia”.
“Tony Burke is in charge of who comes and goes from our country. He is in charge of our national security and our intelligence agencies but this obvious conflict that Labor have tried to hide does draw into question whether he is appropriate to be doing this job,” Duniam said.
It’s the first time the Coalition’s home affairs spokesman has called into question Burke’s fitness for the job.
Burke’s spokesman said: “The government’s message before and after the election has been exactly the same.”
It emerged last year that Burke met with Save the Children and another advocate for the ISIS relatives in August 2024, suggesting the advocates go quiet in public so that Albanese was not forced to publicly oppose any repatriation.
“Politics harder at this end of term,” Burke allegedly said, according to notes of the meeting taken by a department official. “Public pressure makes it harder.”
There is no clear evidence that Burke told the advocates the government would support a repatriation after the election. Yet some left the meeting with the impression, correct or otherwise, that Burke was open to a different approach if Labor was re-elected.
Burke, Rifi and other advocates spoke about the families in June 2025, just after the election, at which point meeting notes show Burke telling the group: “Government doesn’t have a plan to get people out of the camps at this time.”
Recalling that meeting, Rifi told this masthead Burke told them it was “the decision of the government that they’re not going to assist them or plan their repatriation … ‘they knew how to get there, they need to find their way back’.”
The government has downplayed the significance of the talks between Burke and the family advocates. Some sources in the government claim the advocates should have known Burke was using political language to let them down softly.
Until recent weeks, Albanese and his ministers had used neutral language when asked about their role in repatriating ISIS relatives, emphasising the government had no role and was providing no formal assistance except for issuing passports.
This month, Albanese started to proactively argue against any return, using firm language to say he had “contempt” for the parents who “made their bed”.
Rifi, and the government in private, acknowledge that Albanese’s rhetoric pushed Syrian authorities to block the cohort leaving a camp to find a way back to Australia.
“We spoke in people in the [Syrian] government itself, in a very senior position, and they have told us, no uncertain terms … they were not happy with the rhetoric of the prime minister in Australia, because those are Australian citizens,” Rifi told this masthead’s The Morning Edition podcast.
“[They said] ‘It is his responsibility, and if he doesn’t care about them, why should the Syrian Government care about them’?”
Rifi is a prominent member of the Lebanese-Australian community who has often been held up by the Coalition as a crucial voice of moderation in the fight against extremism on the fringes of the Muslim community.
Rifi says he met former Coalition prime minister Scott Morrison and Home Affairs minister Peter Dutton in 2019 and convinced them to bring back eight underage orphans from the Syrian camps after this IS-affiliated parents had been killed.
He has found himself at the centre of a murky political brawl over the return of 34 women and children, some of whom were forced into travelling the caliphate and others who remain hardened Islamists.
New Liberal leader Angus Taylor has spoken nearly daily about the ISIS-supporting group since taking over as leader, using the debate to make his case to “shut the door” to migrants who hold anti-democratic views.
In the letter, Rifi said a 95-year-old neighbour had expressed shock that some members of the Muslim community aligned with pro-Palestine group Muslim Votes Matter were trying to unseat Burke.
“What the hell is your community doing to Tony Burke?” Rifi quoted the man as saying. “He’s done more for Palestinians than anyone else!”
Rifi added: “I keep asking myself the same question.”
Cut through the noise of federal politics with news, views and expert analysis. Subscribers can sign up to our weekly Inside Politics newsletter.
Paul Sakkal is chief political correspondent. He previously covered Victorian politics and has won Walkley and Quill awards. Reach him securely on Signal @paulsakkal.14Connect via X or email.
Michael Bachelard is a senior writer and former deputy editor and investigations editor of The Age. He has worked in Canberra, Melbourne and Jakarta, has written two books and won multiple awards for journalism, including the Gold Walkley.Connect via X or email.
