SOMALI terror suspects Saney Edow Aweys, Yacqub Khayre and Abdirahman Ahmed began attending the controversial 8 Blacks prayer centre in North Melbourne this year, only a few months before they were charged with plotting a terrorist attack.
Police and intelligence agencies have long regarded the old snooker hall turned makeshift mosque, nestled behind a 7-Eleven store on Boundary Road, as a key hub in the militant islamist net-work.
Agencies had placed the hall under surveillance.
All three accused had previously prayed at another Melbourne mosque — the name of which is suppressed — before moving to 8 Blacks, where they took religious instruction in the same small "reading group" throughout this year.
The Australian has learned that Mr Aweys, a 27-year-old father of four, started praying regularly at the mosque about January.
But for at least a year before that, he visited the prayer hall on occasions, even lending his labouring skills to install a security gate at the entrance to the building’s car park.
It is understood he was planning to join the hajj, the pilgrimage to Mecca, in the next three months before travelling on to Somalia alone.
According to a Somali friend of Mr Aweys, who lives in the same Carlton housing commission building and who has known him for eight years, he was a "smiling" and "happy" man who appeared to enjoy life in Australia, and it was only recently that he became attracted to religion.
"He was like an Aussie boy. He used to hang out with the boys, play soccer, go to the clubs," the friend said.
"He had Aussie friends, wog friends — that’s Greeks and Italians to us — and Lebanese friends.
"He wasn’t religious until the last few months. 8 Blacks was only a recent thing."
Having been caught up in a Western lifestyle, older family members initially regarded Mr Aweys’s new-found religiosity as a positive, helping him adhere to a disciplined, family-focused life.
"People told him: ‘You gotta stop playing around, you’ve got a family. Go to the mosque, settle down,"’ the friend said.
Over time he let his beard grow, began dressing in traditional Islamic clothes and voiced more radical ideas.
"But most recently he had actually seemed to go back to normal," said another family friend and community elder.
"His family thought he’d dropped out (of 8 Blacks), he’d shaved his beard, he was being seen at the cafes with the rest of the community, he was working with his family again, everyone thought he was OK."
It is understood Mr Aweys was a labourer in the construction industry. He was preparing for his morning fajr prayer to Mecca on Tuesday when police raided his cramped 15th floor unit and took him away.
His wife, Binte, initially left her home with her three children but returned later that night to be counselled by family and friends. She is now living at another commission flat across the road.
"Auntie, that’s what I call her, she was devastated," says the friend, who lives in the same building. "She couldn’t believe it. No one can. I thought they must have got the wrong dude. He was a good guy, there was nothing odd about him."
A friend who plays soccer with the accused said he is worried for the wellbeing of Mr Aweys’s wife. "They (police) took his savings from his house in the raid, they accused him of funding terrorism," he said. "He’s the only one supporting his whole family; his wife doesn’t work, his whole family are dependent on him."
Mr Aweys appeared before Melbourne Magistrates Court yesterday charged with three offences: conspiring to do acts in preparation for a terrorist act; aiding another person in a hostile act in a foreign state; and preparing for incursions into foreign states, namely Somalia, for the purpose of engaging in hostile activities.
People who know Mr Aweys, and spoken to by The Australian, expressed shock at his arrest. One friend expressed disbelief at the suggestion Mr Aweys intended to leave his family and travel to Somalia.
At a community meeting held yesterday in Coburg, in Melbourne’s north, between police, elders and relatives of the accused, many were angry that only the "harmless" and the "little fish" had been arrested.
Much of that anger came from the family of Yacqub Khayre, of Reservoir, who said he was a "harmless dropout" who had been targeted by police.
Mr Khayre, 22, is facing one charge of conspiring to act in preparation for a terrorist act against the Holsworthy Army base in Sydney.
Mr Khayre’s lawyer Megan Casey applied unsuccessfully in court yesterday to have his name and image suppressed, saying he was vulnerable in custody given his age and appearance.
Mr Khayre is regarded in the community as one of the "Lost Ones" among the 16,000 people of Somali descent who live in Australia, the vast majority in Melbourne.
It is a term given to young men who struggle to adapt to life in Australia and who lose touch with Somali culture and their community after arriving as refugees from their violence-torn homeland.
Elders are increasingly sending these men back to Somalia in a bid to strengthen their bond with the culture, and to develop an appreciation of the opportunities afforded them in Australia.
For that reason, those close to the family say they were supportive when Mr Khayre — who was a "smart kid" and "a good student" as a younger boy — indicated he wanted to return to Somalia to visit relatives.
But it was there, police allege, that he trained for a terrorist attack with al-Shabaab, alongside Walid Osman Mohamed, who is believed to still be in Somalia.
"The family knew he was going back, and they condoned it at the time because they thought it would help him straighten out and find his culture again," a source close to the family said.
"But why he would go back to Somalia with a Lebanese and what happened to him, this we don’t know." Mr Khayre allegedly switched to the 8 Blacks prayer centre four months ago.
Abdirahman Ahmed, 25, is a father of two but is believed to have moved out of the Preston home he had shared with his wife and children.
He began praying at 8 Blacks last December, although he continued to attend his previous mosque in Melbourne where he first met the other two co-accused. He has been charged with one count of conspiring with others to do acts in preparation for a terrorist act, and with aiding or abetting another person to engage in a hostile act in a foreign state.
The director of 8 Blacks, Farah Abdi Hakim — who leases the old two-storey snooker hall and uses the top floor as a mosque and the bottom as a community centre — said Mr Aweys was a friend, but he did not know Mr Khayre.
He denied that his community centre was a hub for Islamic zealots.
"This is my centre but it is open to everybody. I drive a cab, I am a family man, and this is a community centre — if you came, if anyone came, you can come in," he said.
Mr Abdi Hakim, 36, an Australian citizen with eight children, said he was concerned news of the raids would incite racism against the Somali community.
"We move from Somalia because we have a problem with al-Qa’ida there; why would we want to bring that problem here?" heasked. "I have lived in Australia for 20 years. Tell me, when am I going to be an Australian? When do I stop being a Somali?"
Two sources from Melbourne’s Somali community said they had also attended the 8 Blacks prayer centre but nothing sinister had been preached or discussed.