Defence Force's chaplain stabbed in knife attack urges parents to monitor children's online activity

Fr Paul Murphy.

A Defence Forces’ chaplain who was repeatedly stabbed by an Irish boy in an Islamist-inspired knife attack has urged parents to know what their children are doing online.

The call from Fr Paul Murphy comes as Garda and PSNI bosses warn about the radicalisation of young people online, along with an EU report which says the number of minors involved in terrorism and violent extremism has increased sharply — driven by social media and gaming platforms.

Private Dylan Geraghty, the soldier who tackled Fr Murphy’s assailant to the ground in the August 2024 attack at Renmore Barracks in Galway, said that the incident “opened his eyes” to the fact Ireland has “enemies of the State”, despite being neutral.

A 16-year-old boy, a convert to Islam, carried out a sustained attack on Fr Murphy using an eight-inch serrated hunting knife, after being radicalised online by graphic Islamic State material.

It was the first known Islamist-motivated terror attack in Ireland, with three more recorded since.

Fr Murphy said: “There’s still a misconception out there that this was some foreigner who came into our country because of open borders, and brought with him this, this notion of killing, and that’s not the case.

“The point is that parents in Ireland need to be aware that your child, who’s in his room — and I’m not trying to vilify his parents — but, if you have your child in his room, and he’s online the whole time, and he has flags up about Isis, and he has a notebook that he is colouring in with beheadings and all that kind of stuff, there’s an issue.”

Pte Geraghty, who was only 19 at the time of the attack, said: “I think it opened my eyes to the fact that, regardless that we're a neutral country, there are enemies of the state out there, and there are people that do seek harm, to do damage to this country," he said.