(Islamic State flags at Mosul in Iraq, 2014 - for illustrative purposes only)

Hard to believe that police received a report of 50 people in Arabic dress with Islamic State flags and chanting anti-Western slogans - and sat on it for 12 months.

This report from Melbourne's The Age overnight.

A court hearing for six men accused of a plot to sail a small boat to Indonesia to join Islamic State has heard that as many as 50 men and women were seen in a Melbourne park waving the terrorist organisation's flags and chanting anti-Western slogans.

Musa Cerantonio, Paul Dacre, Kadir Kaya, Murat Kaya, Shayden Thorne and Antonio Granata were arrested last May and charged with terror-related offences over the alleged plot.

The six men appeared in the Melbourne Magistrates Court on Monday for a preliminary hearing. 

Businessman Yonatan Hewet, told the court he was running at Footscray Park when he saw a group of men and women chanting religious verses from the Koran in Lebanese-accented Arabic in July 2015.

Mr Hewet could not remember the exact phrases, but said one sounded "anti-Western", and translated the words to the effect of "If you don't follow Allah you are ... impure or you are a 'crusader' in a sense."

The man, who told the court he had worked in a number of Middle Eastern countries and had studied Arabic for about two years, said the chanting was being broadcast via speakers and that flags that appeared to represent Islamic State were also waved.

In his police statement he said that there were about 30 to 40 men dressed in traditional Islamic robes, and 10 women dressed in burqas.

He also said in the statement that the group chanted in Arabic "defeat the Westerners" referring to them as "kuffars" – which he said was "an Arabic term for disbeliever".

He reported the incident to police when he returned to his car, and was contacted by police about a year later, in June 2016 to make a formal statement about it.

http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/tinnie-terror-hearing-told-of-antiwestern-slogans-is-flags-at-footscray-rally-20170515-gw5bvk.html