They are a group of “concerned citizens”, but are very hesitant to say who they really are. If you want to go to one of their meetings, you have to sign a nondisclosure agreement.

Their only address is a PO Box in suburban Melbourne. They won’t say exactly where their money comes from and say they never will.

And they are very opposed to Islam in Australia.

The secretive organisation known as the Q Society has this week been linked to a noisy campaign to stop the construction of a mosque in Bendigo, Victoria.

Over the past few weeks, some of the town’s businesses and residents have awoken to find black balloons tied up outside their premises as a way of protesting the proposed place of worship.

The $3 million development was approved last week at a raucous council meeting. There were reports indicating the Q Society was a “key force” behind the Bendigo campaign (the organisation says it only held a public meeting and was “not a protest organisation”).

The Q Society – named because the group was founded at a 2010 meeting in the upper class Melbourne suburb of Kew – claims to have members across the country. Its mission is about “educating” people about Islam, spokesman Andrew Horwood said, rather than leading the protests.

They describe themselves as “Islam-critical”, are avowed opponents of sharia law and have published a book Getting Through: How To Talk To Non Muslims About The Disturbing Nature of Islam and produced YouTube videos including “How to stop mosques”.

It has few public faces except for its president, Debbie Robinson, and Mr Horwood. “We’re purely educational,” he told news.com.au.

Keysar Trad, from the Islamic Friendship Association of Australia, said the group spreads “disturbing, baseless Islamophobia”. “I think most Australians would normally treat them as a joke but because there’s not enough information out there, not enough good information … about Islam, some people unfortunately subscribe to their message.”

The group is affiliated with an global organisation known as Stop The Islamisation of Nations (SION) – which, as the name suggests, is vehemently anti-Islamic.

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Bendigo has become a rallying point for a loosely affiliated network of right-wing and anti-Islamic groups providing cash and support for the fight to block the city’s first mosque.

The Bendigo campaign, which included the spread of black balloons, is just the latest in a string of challenges to the development of Islamic schools and prayer centres across Australia that have been linked to a handful of political groups and individuals.

Former Queensland One Nation candidate Mike Holt, the chief executive of non-profit organisations Restore Australia and Islam4Infidels, says his groups raised the money to hire a Sydney-based lawyer to fight the mosque proposal. “They use the mosques as a centre for jihad. These things are not like the tea and coffee churches,” Mr Holt said.

Another lobby group, the anti-Islamic Q Society, held a meeting in Bendigo on May 11 to talk to locals about how the mosque would affect their community and how to fight it.

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The anti-Islam group that brought controversial Dutch politician Geert Wilders to Australia has emerged as a key force behind protests against the building of a mosque in Bendigo.

The goldfields city has faced a surge of anti-Islamic sentiment following last week’s approval of its first mosque. An anonymous group tied black balloons to the house of a local councillor who supported the successful planning application – meant as a warning linking domestic violence with Islam.

A Facebook group called “Stop the Mosque in Bendigo” has grown to nearly 8000 “likes” and carries material targeting councillors who supported the mosque as “traitors”.

It has now emerged that the Q Society, which describes itself as “Australia’s leading Islam-critical movement”, organised a meeting in Bendigo on May 11 to advise residents how to stop the mosque. The two-hour meeting was led by Q Society president Debbie Robinson and the group’s head of media and public relations Andrew Horwood. Gavin Boby, from Britain’s Law and Freedom Foundation, also spoke at the meeting via video link.

The event, which was attended by about 100 people, was advertised with pamphlets describing Islam as “totalitarian ideology” which brings violence, misogyny, homophobia and economic stagnation wherever it spreads.

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A community meeting has turned heated after angry Gold Coast residents gathered to object to a mosque being built in their area. A crowd of about 250 people heckled Gold Coast councillor Chris Robbins when she was explaining the council process of approving applications, in reference to the proposal to build a mosque on Cannon St, Currumbin.

“You can object to it, you can hate it or whatever, but the law is you can’t discriminate,” Cr Robbins said. “The town plan is not able to discriminate and say that a land use … can only be used for a particular religion.” Cr Robbins continued to attempt to quell the crowd – even as it started raining – by explaining how residents could object to the development through the council process. However, at times, her advice was drowned by cries about not wanting “that culture here”.

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