UPDATED: Afghan refugee drove into Melbourne pedestrians to protest "mistreatment of Muslims"

Walt is just getting the news from Down Under -- i.e. Australia, specifically Melborune -- where a man drove an SUV through a crowd of pedestrians at one of the city's busiest street corners earlier today. 19 people were injured, four of them critically. Have you jumped to any conclusions yet? Have words like "terrorism", "Muslim" and/or "Islamic" sprung to your mind? How about "Allahu akbar!"?

So far there have been no reports of "God is great!" or any Arabic or other version thereof having been yelled by the perp, but Inspector Bruce Knacker is calling the "incident" on Flinders Street a "deliberate act". When asked about the motivation of the driver, the coppers said they "have no indication that it is connected to terrorism." The driver, who was arrested at the scene, was known to authorities, a top cop told reporters, but apparently not so well known as to be identified by name!

The man "has a history of drug use and mental illness," said Acting Chief Commissioner Shane Patton, as well as "historical assault" convictions. Although ACC Patton wouldn't give out the name of the driver, the Melbourne Herald Sun identified him as "ice-addicted, Afghan-Australian Saeed Noori."

Although Australia has no equivalent to Canada's M-103 which "discourages" any mention of anything which would fan the flames of Islamophobia, Aussie police appear to have received the same memo as the Canadian police who deemed it politically incorrect to reveal the name, ethnicity, religion or citizenship status of the man who burst into a Vaughan ON bank last Friday demanding drugs and a telephone call to President Trump. The man, who may (or may not) have had a history of drug use and mental illness was shot dead by the Canuck cops. See "Canuck cops cover up terror attack outside Toronto", WWW 16/12/17.

Mr Noori got off lightly. An off-duty police sergeant shopping nearby was the first to arrive at the scene, taking hold of the driver seconds after his SUV crashed into a bus stop. Footage from a local TV station showed uniformed cops dragging him from the crumpled vehicle and cuffing him a short time later.

UPDATE ADDED 22/12/17: The Melbourne Herald Sun, the first to identify the attacker as Saeed Noori, persuaded the chief inspector of the Victoria State Police to walk back earlier statements that the coppers knew of no reason for the terrorist crime or of what might have motivated the "Afghan-Australian" driver of the vehicle to ram it into a crowd of pedestrians.

The latest version of the official story is that Mr Noori is an Afghan refugee -- not a citizen as the phrase "Afghan-Australian" was meant to suggest -- and "attributed his actions to perceived mistreatment of Muslims." The top cop said that when the perp was interviewed (see picture above), he "spoke about dreams, he spoke about voices...but he also did attribute some of his actions to the poor treatment of Muslims. I don't know the exact detail, to do with Allah [like "Allahu akbar!"? Ed.] and some ramblings about ASIO (the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation)."

Asked if there were links to terrorism, Acting Chief Commissioner Shane Patton -- for it was he -- said, "That's certainly one area we're exploring in respect to motivation." Another stunning example of the greatest oxymoron of all -- "police intelligence".