CAIRO, August 13, 2005 (IslamOnlin.net) – People behind the July 7 London bomb attacks acted on their own and had no link to Al-Qaeda, a British newspaper revealed Saturday, August 13, citing the findings of the biggest anti-terrorist investigation held in Britain.

The four suicide bombers were also not linked to the other four who failed to blow up explosives on buses and underground trains on July 21, The Independent reported.

"Of course, things could change if new intelligence comes through, but it looks increasingly as if these people were largely working on their own. It is not something we expected," a police source told the daily.

Four young British Muslims attacked three London underground trains and a bus on July 7, killing 52 people.

An apparent bid to repeat the attacks on July 21 failed and police have arrested four people they say were behind it.

"It is concerning that none were on the intelligence radar," said a counter-terror source, voicing concerns that other "clean skin" terror cells might be hiding in the country and planning attacks.

"We can't disrupt them all. They only have to be lucky once - and they have been. At some point there will be another suicide or bombing group."

The inquiry involved the Security Service (MI5), the Secret Intelligence Service commonly known as MI6, the listening center at the Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ), an intelligence and security organization, and the police.

They have been trawling through telephone and computer records, e-mails, forensic evidence, and investigating friends and associates to build up a picture of the suicide bombers.

The initial findings further found that there was no leader from abroad and the bombers were "self-sufficient".

"All the talk about 'Mr Bigs' and Al-Qaeda masterminds looks like something from a film script at the moment," the police source said.

"The key point is that the events were not connected. It appears they were self-contained, rather than being organized by some kind of mastermind," agreed the counter-terror source.

Senior police sources in West Yorkshire believe that gyms and boxing clubs in Leeds - rather than mosques - were used as a meeting point for the bombers, radicalized by Mohammad Sidique Khan.

One of the four would-be July 21 bombers told investigators on July 31 that he and the other three were motivated by the Iraq war and not by religious fervor, denying any link to Al-Qaeda network.

In an obvious retreat from his earlier stance, British Prime Minister Tony Blair recently acknowledged that the Iraq war was being used to recruit terrorists.

An ICM poll for the Guardian found on July 19 that two-thirds of Britons believe the July 7 bombings were linked to Blair's support for the US-led invasion of Iraq.

The "ill-considered venture" of invading Iraq has turned into a "mess" fueling attacks around the world and providing Al-Qaeda with sympathizers across the Muslim world, award-winning British reporter Patrick Cockburn wrote in the Independent on July 25.

Investigations further debunked five "myths" that circulated in media in the wake of the July 7 bombings and the failed attempts, The Independent said.

They found out that Haroon Rashid Aswat, who was reported to be the mastermind behind the July 7 bombings and had been arrested in Pakistan, was never in Pakistan.

Scotland Yard does not view the a British-born Muslim, later detained in Zambia, as a key player in the bombings, according to the paper.

Investigations also showed that a terrorist who was widely reported to have infiltrated into Britain to plan for the blasts was an innocent Pakistani with a similar name to a suspected Al-Qaeda figure.

Another false claim was that police were searching for a "fifth" bomber connected to the July 7 team who was caught on CCTV at Luton railway station.

It had also been alleged that one or two of the men alleged to be responsible for the failed July 21 attacks were at a white-water rafting center at the same time as two of the July 7 suicide bombers, Shahzad Tanweer and Khan.

It is now thought to be a case of mistaken identity.