Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews said: “These people arrested today are not people of faith, they don’t represent any culture. This is not an issue of how you pray or where you were born. This is not about those issues.” In saying that, he was signaling that even when Muslims plot to commit mass murder in the name of Islam on one of Australia’s most important national days, Australian authorities are going to stay their disastrous course: they’re going to continue to pretend that jihad terror has nothing to do with Islam, and that importing large numbers of Muslim immigrants is simply a humanitarian issue with no national security implications whatsoever. Daniel Andrews could just as well have said, “These people arrested today represent a problem we dare not confront. So get used to it, because there are going to be plenty more plots like this one.”
“Men arrested in Melbourne over alleged ‘ISIS-inspired’ Anzac Day terrorist plot,” ABC.net.au, April 18, 2015 (thanks to Graham):
Counterterrorism police have alleged two of the five men they arrested in an operation in Melbourne this morning were planning an Islamic State-inspired terrorist attack on an Anzac Day ceremony.
Sevdet Besim, 18, of Hallam, has been charged with conspiring to commit a terrorist act and appeared in the Melbourne Magistrates Court….
A second man, 18, from Hampton Park, was also arrested on terrorism-related offences this morning during a major joint counterterrorism team operation.
A third man was arrested for weapons offences and two other men were in custody assisting police with their enquiries, after seven search warrants were executed.
Three of the five men arrested were injured in the operation.
One suffered a head wound and another resisted arrest.
Capsicum spray was used to subdue the men.
The Australian Federal Police said they believed the two 18-year-olds were plotting an attack to take place on Anzac Day.
Victoria Police Deputy Commissioner Shane Patton said it was believed the attacks were to have involved the use of “edged knives”.
“It is alleged both men were undertaking preparations for a terrorist attack at an Anzac Day activity in Melbourne which included targeting police officers,” he said.
AFP Acting Deputy Commissioner Neil Gaughan described the plot as being inspired by Islamic State (IS).
“At this stage we have no information that it was a planned beheading. But there was reference to an attack on police,” he told a news conference in Melbourne.
“Some evidence that was collected at a couple of the scenes and some other information we have leads us to believe that this particular matter was ISIS-inspired.”…
The ABC understands that a number of the arrested men attended the Al Furqan Islamic study centre in South Springvale and were associates of Abdul Numan Haider, who also attended the centre.
Haider was shot and killed by counterterrorism police in September last year.
AFP Acting Deputy Commissioner Neil Gaughan said members of the community should not feel anxious.
“At this stage we’re comfortable that we have this threat fully contained,” he said….
You don’t have this threat remotely close to contained.
Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews said the alleged terrorist plot was “simply evil, plain and simple”.
He said Victorians needed to take the threats seriously but never be “defined by them”.
“These people arrested today are not people of faith, they don’t represent any culture,” he said.
“This is not an issue of how you pray or where you were born. This is not about those issues.
“Together with Victoria Police, Commonwealth law enforcement and intelligence agencies, the Victorian Government continues to take reasonable and necessary steps to keep every Victorian safe.”…