British police investigate hospital terrorist cell

**Tony** · 07-03-07, 07:17 AM

By Europe correspondent Rafael Epstein

Mohammed Jamil Abdelkader Asha, one of the suspects arrested in Britain by police investigating three failed bomb attacks is a Jordanian doctor of Palestinian origin, officials in Jordan said today. (AFP: Khalil Mazraawi) British newspapers are reporting that as many as six of the eight people arrested over failed car bomb attacks in London and Glasgow are doctors who may have planned the attacks while living in medical residences at a Scottish hospital.

One of the men arrested straight after the attack on Glasgow Airport has been named as Bilal Abdullah, a doctor from Iraq who qualified in Baghdad in 2004. Mohammed Asha, 26, a doctor of Palestinian origin who qualified in Jordan, also in 2004, was arrested with his wife on Saturday evening when unmarked police cars blocked a motorway in northern England to stop their car. Some reports say police may have been trying to trace the airport bomb suspects before Saturday's attack in Glasgow. Questions are being asked about why both were issued with British work permits in the last two years, despite a massive security crackdown. The BBC is reporting that one suspect has been arrested in an unnamed country overseas this morning (see Australian post re this).

One UK newspaper cartoon has an image of a flaming Jeep crashing into 10 Downing Street with the new Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, in the window. The Jeep has 'Legacy' written on it - a clear reference to previous prime minister Tony Blair's position on Iraq and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. And it now seems at least two of the men arrested here come from the heart of those conflicts. After the flaming Jeep crashed into Glasgow Airport, Abdullah was the one man left unscathed. Born in Iraq, he trained as a doctor in Baghdad and registered as a doctor in the UK in August last year.

He worked at a hospital in Paisley near Glasgow, and sometimes lived in the buildings provided for hospital staff. Two men in their 20s were arrested at those residency buildings today. They too are said to have recently arrived in the UK, raising the prospect that the attacks were planned by a group living within the hospital's grounds.
The second Glasgow attacker is being treated at the same hospital.
Asha, born in Jordan, came to the UK in 2005 to train in neurology.
His family in Jordan insist he is innocent, saying he rang them recently and was planning a short stay with them in coming weeks.
But Jordanian officials have been quoted by news agencies saying he could be the mastermind of the recent attacks. His father Jamil has asked Jordan's King Abdullah to intervene on his son's behalf.

"I am sure that Mohammed did not have any links of this nature, because his history in Jordan since he was born, he has not undertaken any kind of activity of this nature," he said.

The first car bomb was found in Haymarket, in London's West End. The mobile phone that was plucked out of that car by a brave police officer tells a lot about the way this massive investigation is working. Calls made from the phone were traced by police, and 36 hours after the car here first caused concern, police tried the number of a real estate agent in Glasgow. There was no answer.
Police went to the real estate office, but no one was in. A few hours later the agent finally called police and explained that someone with that mobile phone had in recent weeks rented a house 15 minutes' drive from Glasgow Airport. Ten minutes after police were contacted, the airport terminal was attacked. One of the men arrested in that foiled bombing is believed to Abdullah. He and another man in custody rented the house a short drive from where they were arrested. The calls made on that mobile phone are a major reason why police believe the two men who attacked Glasgow Airport also drove the two car bombs in London.

http://abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/07/03/1968221.htm