Shortly before 4pm yesterday Paul King and his flatmate Alistair Wilmer were at home in Tulse Hill, south London, when the telephone rang.

“We were just having a normal Saturday, watching television, and Ally picked up the phone and it was the police saying, ‘Leave the flat immediately’. We also heard police cars and vans rushing into the area, so we put on our shoes and ran to see what was happening. As soon as we got out of the building, armed police told us to put our hands in the air and walk away.”

King and Wilmer happened to be in a flat next to a property that was about to be raided for suspected terrorists.

Six vehicles had stormed into Scotia Road disgorging more than 20 armed police. Some were fanning out setting up a cordon. Others were evacuating residents from nearby properties: many screamed or burst into tears. Yet more police ordered people in properties further away from the target to stay away from doors and windows.

Keith Parker, 42, a sales rep who lives in the road, telephoned his 18-year old daughter Lisa who was in her house in nearby Leckhampton Place. She told him that more armed police were entering properties around her as a way of surrounding the building on Scotia Road.

“This is not the best neighbourhood in the world,” said Parker. “But we have not had this kind of trouble before.”

The sound of gunfire rang out. Police were firing tear gas into a flat they believed to be occupied by a group of Asian men in their twenties suspected of being terrorists who had attempted to set off bombs on three Tube trains and a bus last Thursday.

The occupants usually kept themselves to themselves, said King, who had not known any of them personally. “They were Asian men and just minded their own business. You didn’t really know who was staying there because they were constantly in and out.”

That suspicion and uncertainty are what lie behind the tragedy of a man shot dead by police last week at Stockwell Underground station. He had been seen leaving the house in Scotia Road and police had feared he was a suicide bomber. But yesterday Scotland Yard admitted that he had “no connection” to the incidents last Thursday.

Last night after a series of door-busting raids by armed police, two men were in custody, an innocent man was dead and the harsh realities of the war on terror were exploding all over London and beyond. After four suicide bombers had killed 52 people two weeks ago, other suspected bombers were still on the run.

The intelligence services were searching for links between the attackers of 7/7 and those of 21/7 — and for any sign of a mastermind who had controlled both groups.

In addition to the shock over the Stockwell shooting, an undercurrent of fear that more terrorists are waiting to strike was present everywhere.

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