KEY POINTS:
BRISBANE - It is something of a myth that extreme poverty, hardship and alienation are the only driving forces behind the making of a terrorist.
For many years, security analysts have been aware that the most feared young Muslims who associate with extremist groups are highly educated individuals from middle-class backgrounds.
They are doctors, engineers, computer specialists and scientists living in major cities - not illiterate men from disadvantaged families on the fringe of society.
An al Qaeda leader foreshadowed their deadly potential earlier this year in a conversation with Baghdad-based British Anglican cleric, Canon Andrew White, when he said: "The people who cure you will kill you".
What unites these professionals is an attractive, intellectually stimulating and sophisticated ideology known as Islamism which, according to ASIO chief Paul O'Sullivan, has several key strands.
First is the version of history that places modern Western governments, such as the US, UK and Australia, as leading an ongoing fight against Islam which dates back to the Crusades.
Second is an extreme interpretation of Islam that condemns non-Muslims as infidels and those Muslims who do not subscribe to the same interpretation of Islam as apostates.
Third, there is the political theory, which holds that Western values -- secularism, democracy and the separation of religion and state -- are incompatible with Islam.
Fourth, there is the jihadist mission, in which it is the duty of every individual Muslim to not only hate, but physically attack, Crusaders -- the United States and its allies -- and Muslims who do not hold to the "true faith" as seen by extremists.
Finally, there is the mission to create a global Islamic state known as a caliphate, based on strict sharia (Islamic) law.
Former Islamic radical Ed Husain, the British author of a book on Islamism, says fanaticism often turns to terrorism because of the frustration that comes with the realisation that the caliphate is not being achieved.
He also says many terrorists do not have a sophisticated grasp of Islam, as opposed to the political ideology called Islamism.
Experts say many Muslims may be drawn into extremism by a variety of personal issues, such as the death of a family member or friend or unemployment, or grievances, such as the occupation of Palestine.
They may also simply want to be part of a supportive, tight-knit group in a society with a rising level of family breakdown.
Alternatively the group could be the support base for someone who is working or studying overseas, alienated and many thousands of kilometres from their homeland, friends and family.
In any case, for British and Australian counter-terror police investigating thwarted bombing attempts in London and Glasgow, the fact that the eight suspects are doctors or medical students would not have come as much of a surprise.
Nor would it have been surprising that they were of similar ethnic backgrounds and had formed a tight-knit group, largely keeping to themselves.
Taking the logic further, it should not have come out of the blue that several of the group sought to travel overseas, to such attractive far-flung destinations as Australia which is crying out for skilled professionals.
Enter Dr Mohamed Haneef, an Indian national working for the National Health Service in the north-west England city of Liverpool, who took up a job on Queensland's Gold Coast in September 2006 after seeing a state government advertisement.
Dr Haneef, the son of a school teacher, was raised in the Karnataka state town of Moodigere, and studied medicine at India's Rajiv Gandhi University of Health Sciences from where he graduated in 2002.
British health authorities have confirmed he worked part-time in 2005 at the same hospital in north-western England as another doctor arrested over the bombs.
In England he also associated with cousins Dr Khalid Ahmed, the driver of the jeep that exploded outside Glasgow airport, and Dr Sabeel Ahmed, who was arrested in Liverpool last weekend.
It is now known both the Ahmed brothers tried to apply for work in Western Australia but were knocked back because their qualifications and references were inadequate.
Dr Khalid Ahmed worked with Dr Bilal Abdulla, a British-born Iraqi diabetes specialist who was a passenger in the Glasgow jeep and is believed by intelligence sources to have been at the core of an alleged terror cell and have been recruited by the late Abu Musab al-Zarqawi - al-Qaeda's former leader in Iraq.
The Times newspaper quoted a friend who attended the Medical College of Baghdad University with Dr Abdulla who said he was a "religious fanatic", and mysteriously abandoned his studies for a year.
As British and Australian police piece together the movements and communications of the alleged terror cell, a disparate group of people have painted a rosier picture of Dr Haneef.
Immigration officials say he passed all regular checks to get his 457 temporary work visa and was not on any alert list.
Queensland Premier Peter Beattie said the arrested doctor was regarded by Gold Coast Hospital as a "model citizen".
His Gold Coast landlord described him as a quiet man.
Dr Haneef's family said his one-way ticket to India could be explained by the fact that his wife had given birth to a baby girl just over a week ago and the baby is suffering from jaundice.
They also argue it was a mobile phone SIM card - a smart card with identifying information for mobile phones that can be transferred to another phone - that got him into trouble.
He is understood to have given the card to a friend before he left Britain last year for Australia.
The user of the SIM card received a call on his phone made by one of the alleged bombers.
But the facts of the case have yet to emerge.
As police continue to grill Dr Haneef in the Brisbane watchhouse, with a deadline of Monday to charge him, intelligence figures continue to piece together the complex web that led to two failed attacks in the UK.
And cast their net further to foil any future bombings.
- AAP
