Last month, police found 50kg of explosives stashed in a Brisbane home. They allegedly belong to a white man, Daniel Fing, who previously was found guilty of carrying out a car bombing. Some reportedly were of the type used in the 2005 London bombings. Not much has subsequently been made of the discovery, or the story.

But now, for unrelated reasons, Australian intelligence agencies, the federal police and the federal government have put the country on a war footing. Unprecedented raids against an alleged terrorist cell have taken place.

We have been told that a senior Islamic State commander has exhorted followers in Australia to randomly behead someone in central Sydney. A young man is now charged for allegedly having taken the call – it is unclear whether he had any intention of acting on the alleged instructions. We are also told of a plot against Parliament House.

The Herald Sun reports today: “Senior intelligence sources confirmed that ‘chatter’ about Parliament House had been intercepted and they now held fears the building had already been ‘scoped out’ for pre-planning of a ‘Mumbai’ style attack involving automatic weapons.”

“Chatter”, they say. We’ve heard this before: the faux case against Jack Thomas, David Hicks, the thought crimes and entrapment of the Barwon 13. Of the latter, Greg Barns, a barrister and a spokesman for the Australian Lawyers Alliance, recently wrote:

“Back in November 2005 former Victorian premier Steve Bracks and police commissioner Christine Nixon announced that an imminent terrorist attack on Melbourne had been thwarted by the arrest of a number of young men and a self-styled sheikh in Melbourne.

“I acted for one of those men in a subsequent Supreme Court trial in 2008 and can tell you that the evidence presented to the court in that case suggested nothing of the sort. There was no planned terrorist attack by members of this group, just chatter and some bonding activities …”

Millions of Australia citizens would need to be locked away if we took seriously all “chatter” about blowing up the parliament or stuffing a particular politician in a chaff bag and drowning them at sea.

After the initial shock and awe of yesterday’s raids and today’s morning papers (the front pages of which scream: “EVIL WITHIN” – Herald Sun; “TERROR AUSTRALIS” – Age; “PRIME TARGET” – Daily Telegraph; “FAIR DINKUM SAVAGERY” – Courier Mail), what is to be made of it?

Writing in Crikey, Bernard Keane is more circumspect than others: “Examined a little more closely, the details [of the threat] became more problematic. Despite talk of a ‘cell’, a total of two people were charged, including one for firearms offences, which for such a vast operation seems disproportionately small … The Queensland raids led to further charges against two men already in custody, not new arrests. The ‘beheading’ turned out to be assumed by the media, rather than asserted by the police.” 

Australia may well be a target of Islamic militants – successive governments’ backing, both political and military, of US barbarity in the Middle East, participation in the War on Terror and demonisation of the Muslim population has created deep resentment. It would be absurd to think otherwise. Fundamentalist bigotry that exalts raw violence has capitalised on and become an outlet for intense bitterness – at least among a minority.

Less discussed, however, is that most of those people who have had their passports cancelled and who are accused of raising funds for Islamic fighting organisations have, to this point, engaged in activities against the Assad dictatorship.

Some have gone to fight with the Islamic State, but it doesn’t hold a monopoly on encouraging violence. “BLOW THEM TO HELL”, railed Sydney’s Daily Telegraph even before these alleged plots were made public – as though more than 1 million dead Iraqis, the legacy of the 2003 invasion, were not enough. The Murdoch stable never tires of encouraging slaughter in the Middle East.

All this is a gift for the Liberals. The narrative today is that Tony Abbott and the surveillance state are our proven last line of defence against unspeakable acts carried out by unknown agents and enemies. What a pot of gold for a shaky government with an unpopular domestic agenda.

However, if life is sacrosanct for this government, why has it cut hospital funding by half a billion dollars? Why is it attempting to destroy universal free healthcare? According to figures obtained by the Herald Sun under Freedom of Information laws, in Victoria alone more than 16 people per week died in 2013 while waiting for surgery. Sixteen. Every week.

Why is it trying to push the living standards of pensioners further into the gutter? According to research conducted by the Lord Mayor's Charitable Foundation, the elderly already make up more than 80 percent of those living in abject poverty. Yet the proposed new indexing arrangements will gradually and relatively erode the value of what already is a paltry sum.

Why is it intent on destroying or neutering trade unions that are the last line of defence for health and safety on dangerous worksites? According to Safe Work Australia, 129 people have been killed at work so far this year – why is there no blitz to protect people, only moves to further weaken workers’ abilities to protect themselves?

Why does it allow tens of billions of dollars in tax concessions per year for the already affluent, while 100,000 endure homelessness?

Why does it grant billions of dollars per year to the mining magnates, while more than 17 percent of children live in poverty?

If “the Australian way of life” is so sacrosanct for the corporate media, why does it not wage a relentless campaign to have these issues addressed? They obviously represent a clear and present danger – the figures speak for themselves.

To ask the question is to answer it. The Middle East is not the only theatre of war. There is a class war going on in Australia and it is resulting in a large number of casualties. The government and its backers in the media just don’t want to talk about those right now.

And why would they? Death in a hospital waiting room is deplorable, but easily explainable and totally impersonal. It brings into question broader government priorities that throw into relief the social divisions at the heart of Team Australia.

Terrorism on the other hand strikes randomly, and not just through occasional life ending brutality. It strikes deep into the psyche and, when done properly – in deed or as spectacle – embeds itself as panic, fear and, in this case, as rage against Muslims.

That’s incredibly useful for the Australian government. 

Twitter: @Benji_Hillier