By Duncan Gardham and Gordon Rayner
Telegraph.co.uk
Two NHS doctors planned a campaign of "indiscriminate and wholesale murder" with a series of car bomb attacks across Britain which culminated in a failed suicide attack on Glasgow Airport, a jury has been told.
Islamic extremists Bilal Abdulla, 29, and Mohammed Asha, 27, plotted the "spectaculars" as "punishment" for Britain's foreign policy in Iraq and Israel, it is alleged.
Iraqi national Abdulla and a third man, Kafeel Ahmed, tried and failed to blow up cars packed with gas canisters, nails and petrol outside a nightclub in London's West End in June 2007.
When those devices failed to detonate, Abdulla and Ahmed launched the alleged suicide attack on Glasgow Airport the following day. Ahmed, 28, later died from burns he sustained after setting off petrol bombs which failed to blow up their Jeep.
Saudi-born Asha, a senior house officer in the neurology department of University Hospital of North Staffordshire, was not directly involved in either attack but supplied money to buy the cars and bomb components, was in touch with the other two men at crucial stages of the plot and may have offered "spiritual and ideological guidance", the prosecution allege.
Three other cars had been purchased by the gang and other possible targets including the Old Bailey and the City of London had been filmed by the plotters, Woolwich Crown Court in south east London was told.
Jonathan Laidlaw QC, prosecuting, said: "In addition to the killing of the innocent the objective was to seize public attention, both here and internationally. By the carrying out of a series of explosions, with no warning as to where the next strike would occur, the terrorists knew the public would be gripped by fear."
He added that the attacks failed through sheer "good fortune" on the part of the public.
"Apart from the shocking nature of the activity these two defendants were engaged in, the extraordinary thing is that both men are doctors," said Mr Laidlaw. "They turned their attention away from the treating of illness to the planning of murder."
Mr Laidlaw said the plot had not been picked up by the security services, but "who would have suspected two doctors to have been involved in such planning?"
Both men deny conspiracy to murder and conspiracy to cause explosions.
The jury was told that the plot, which had taken six months to plan, was put into action when Ahmed and Abdulla drove two Mercedes cars packed with gas canisters and nails from their rented house in Glasgow to London, where they parked outside the Tiger Tiger nightclub in the Haymarket, which was packed with more than 500 people.
The second of the cars, a blue, L-registered Mercedes, was parked near a bus stop in Cockspur Street, just south of the night club, possibly as a secondary device "deliberately placed there so it would be in the path of those evacuated."
The two men, who had stopped at London's Gateway services to fill the cars with "as much fuel as possible" on the way, opened the valves on the gas cylinders and retreated to "a safe distance".
At around 1.30am on June 29, 2007, the two men allegedly tried to detonate the car bombs by calling mobile phones inside the cars which had been rigged up to home-made detonators.
"Had it been executed in the way intended [it] would have resulted in the loss of many lives particularly among the young seeking entertainment in the area or on their way home after a night out," the prosecutor said.
But a miscalculation meant the car bombs failed to detonate, and the two men decided on a drastic change of plan.
Because the cars had not been destroyed, the men knew that the police would quickly piece together their identities from the car registrations, the mobile phones and CCTV images, said Mr Laidlaw.
"The change in approach was that the next attack was to be a suicide attack," said Mr Laidlaw. "The bombers, even though the attack was likely to result in their own deaths, were absolutely determined that the next vehicle would explode. There was to be no repeat of the failure of the devices in London."
The next day, on Saturday June 30, the busiest day of the year at Glasgow airport, a Jeep packed with gas canisters was driven into the main doors of the terminal building with Ahmed at the wheel and Abdulla in the passenger seat. The men threw down petrol bombs in an effort to ensure the vehicle exploded.
"Again fortune intervened to save those inside the terminal," Mr Laidlaw said. "The Jeep became trapped in the terminal doors and despite the best efforts of the bombers and although there was a fierce fire, the jeep did not explode."
The jury was told that the men had first met in 2004 and 2005, whilst staying at an Islamic centre in Cambridge, where Asha was working at Addenbrooke's Hospital.
At some point the men, who all adhered to "extreme Islamic beliefs", decided to launch "revengeful" attacks on Britain, said Mr Laidlaw, because of what they saw as the country's "persecution" of Muslims in the Middle East.
They spent six months planning the attacks, it is alleged, with e-mails between Ahmed and Abdulla talking about "experiments" in February 2007.
In April Abdulla rented a house in a quiet residential street near Paisley, Renfrewshire, 14 miles from Glasgow, where they could prepare and arm the vehicles, the court was told.
Ahmed flew back to Britain in May after eight months in India, and within days he and Abdulla, a junior house officer in general surgery at the Royal Alexandra Hospital in Paisley, had carried out reconnaissance in London, Mr Laidlaw said.
Among the areas they visited were Aldgate in the City, Leicester Square, Charing Cross, Ludgate Hill, near the Old Bailey, and Upper St Martin's Lane, near the Haymarket.
They were in frequent contact with Asha during the visit to London, Mr Laidlaw said.
"It is as if Abdulla was reporting back, taking instructions from or seeking the approval of (Asha)," said Mr Laidlaw.
Having bought three Mercedes cars, a BMW 525 and a Jeep through Autotrader magazine, the men bought gas canisters and large quantities of nails from B&Q and petrol cans from Halfords and duvets and pillows from Tesco and Asda to cover up the gas cylinders.
Abdulla claims he never intended to kill or injure anyone, but was simply taking part in a protest, a defence dismissed as "ludicrous" by the prosecution.
The trial continues.
Comment from Jihad Watch: Well, one who is convinced that poverty and/or lack of education causes terrorism might have been surprised. Of course, such a glaring exception to the theory should only point more strongly to the fact that there must be some other factor at work in jihadist violence -- something to do with jihad, for starters. Most, however, will continue to search for something else altogether: alienation, "otherness," British foreign policy, and so forth.
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