In a couple of weeks time, she will announce she is running as the Labor Party's candidate in the federal Western Australian seat of Cowan, the Liberals' most marginal seat in the state.

It seems an unexpected leap for one of the country's leading counter-terrorism experts when she is  knee-deep in the busiest and most critical moment of her career.

But it should have been obvious. We've barely sat down and Aly has plenty to say: she is gesticulating vigorously, throwing in a few swear words as she laments the political chest-beating and harsh law enforcement action that has defined the government's approach to de-radicalisation.

"This is what gets really frustrating," she says. "The answers are complex but it's not rocket science. The key ingredient, of course, is political will.

"And when you have politicians coming out and saying things that aren't really conducive to the kind of environment we need to work in, you find that half of your efforts and time and resources are spent battling that instead of actually doing the kind of work you need to do to address the issue."

The Egyptian-born academic politely shoos waiters away several times, barely having a moment to look at her menu as we discuss everything from Tony Abbott's controversial statement on Muslim leaders not doing enough to promote Islam "as a religion of peace" to the head of ASIO being criticised for asking politicians to temper their language around Islam and terrorism.

Lunch has to be a fairly quick bite at Pei Modern, the restaurant in the Sydney hotel she often spends more time in than her own home in Perth.

Even when her lamb saganaki burger arrives ("I hardly ever eat a burger," she says with delight. "I'm always trying to watch my weight."), it almost goes cold as the political assessments continue.

"You think, how bad does it need to get before the government gets the message that something is amiss here? It's been 15 years since 9/11 and Tony Abbott was saying the same shit as John Howard was. For all the hours I put into this job, you're telling me nothing's changed?"

Entering politics would complete a neat circle for Aly. Her first steps towards a career in countering violent extremism were through a government job in the early 2000s, as a policy officer for WA's Office of Multicultural Interests.

She was soon drawn into implementing post-September 11 strategies, inspiring her to complete a PhD in 2008 on the perceptions of terrorism and then her first book in 2011, Terrorism & Global Security: Historical and Contemporary Perspectives.

Now she is considered a global authority on understanding how and why young people are drawn into violent extremism. In the weeks before our lunch, she was in Vienna, Madrid and Abu Dhabi. Before that, she was personally invited by US President Barack Obama to the White House's Countering Violent Extremism summit.

But Aly, 48, felt like she had hit a plateau.

"When you're on the international and the national circuit a lot, it gets to a point where you realise there's a glass ceiling to everything," she says. "That glass ceiling is more like a cement wall. It's the limit that you can take your work when you're not coming from inside the government. I just thought, it's time. It's time to step in."

In the last two years, Aly has been busier than ever. She has carved out a niche as a youth-focused researcher and academic at two WA universities, working closely with young people including former extremists and radicalised teens.

She has established a youth-led organisation, People Against Violent Extremism, producing videos and other material to counter the messages being spread by Islamic State. She has created tool kits for picking up the online signs of extremism and analysed the social media activity of hundreds of right-wing and Islamic extremists.

Every week, she receives calls from around the country. A grandmother worried about some of the thoughts her grandson is expressing. A friend looking for advice to help prevent someone from spiralling into extremism.

Days earlier, she met with the distraught family of a teenage boy arrested in counter-terrorism raids in Sydney, desperate for some advice and guidance. She is constantly seeing men being taken away from their mothers.

"Sometimes you feel like you're drowning in despair," she says. "But at the end of the day, it's very close to home for me."

When Aly's sons were aged one and three, she divorced her Egyptian husband. She raised her boys as a single mother on paltry welfare payments, living in borderline poverty, with no father figure, and they attended a Muslim school in Perth.

"On paper, they're like the poster children for being vulnerable," she says. "For years I worried. I used to say, 'Let Al Qaeda or Daesh come and try to take my boys and watch me stand up like a lion', because I was shit scared.

"You don't just worry about your kid getting into drugs or crime, there is another layer of worry to add to everything. So this is not just something I do, this is something that I need to find a solution for. This is personal for me."

Now 22 and 25, her sons are pursuing careers in communications and law. Their mother is married to the former captain of Australia's ice hockey team, David Allen, who has become "the male role model they never had".

"I remember saying to my youngest son when he was 18, 'I haven't exactly been good at providing you with the stable role model and he said, 'we didn't need one Mum, we had you'," she says. "I always say, 'Far out, my kids turned out OK despite me. Not because of me'."

Born in Egypt in 1967, Aly moved to Australia when she was two. Her parents, a nurse and an engineer, came in an assisted migration program with hopes of climbing the socio-economic ladder then returning to Egypt.

They lived a modest life in Lakemba and Chipping Norton, in Sydney's west, before Aly returned to Egypt after high school to "discover her roots" and ended up staying for a degree in English and comparative literature at the prestigious American University in Cairo.

"My classmates were, like, Queen Rania from Jordan and sons and daughters of ambassadors. And I was the odd one out – this kid from Australia," she says.

She married an Egyptian man in her last year of studies and they returned to Australia to raise their two children closer to her parents, who had been persuaded by friends not to return to Egypt and instead retired and moved to Perth. Five years later, Aly and her husband divorced.

"So by the time I was 27, I was divorced with a three-year-old and a one-year-old and living in Perth, dirt poor, trying to raise kids on $400 a fortnight."

She worked part-time teaching English to migrants and quickly finished a masters in education before she was seconded to the Office of Multicultural Interests.

"There were dark times but it's good to have that background because it keeps reminding you that you had humble beginnings," she says.

"When I was going to the White House people were like, 'Wow you must be so excited to meet Obama' and I was like, 'meh'. To me it's more the stories of everyday people that are more inspiring, like the single parent who managed to raise their kids."

The way Aly found her third husband, Allen, was another neat circle.

They met 11 years ago when they were both working for the WA government – she  in multiculturalism, he in crime prevention after a career as a police officer. They were both married at the time but became part of a circle of social work friends until they both moved jobs and lost contact.

Then, four years ago, he emailed her out of the blue and they caught up for a coffee. She asked him how things were at home and he said they were bad, he was getting a divorce. He asked her how things were at home and she said they were bad, she was getting a divorce.

Their connection may have seemed unlikely at first. He grew up in Canada and was the "jock" who excelled at ice hockey. She was the nerdy, overweight kid who preferred debating to sports.

"To think that now we're together, given how different our backgrounds are but how people's paths come together, it's fascinating."

Aly describes herself as  "more of a secular Muslim". She practises in her own time but doesn't want religion to define her professional life or views.

She has received some backlash from segments of the Muslim community, who tell her she lacks credibility because she doesn't wear the hijab.

However, criticism has been more harsh from anti-Islam exponents who send her hate mail and death threats, once forcing her to change the locks at her Perth home.

Speaking out against the pitfalls of the approach to de-radicalisation has made the target on her back bigger. However she says she isn't just attacking the government blindly.

She has done thousands of hours of research and spent time with former extremists and families of teenagers who have been arrested for acts like expressing thoughts, or possessing images or radical material.

Working with people like London bombing survivor Gil Hicks, she knows the horror that violent extremism can lead to. Yet working with young people, she sees how prison only makes them more violent, how attempts to police them at school makes them more rebellious, how political rhetoric feeds a sense of us versus them.

"My advice to the mums is often just to be the glue and play that role, continue to keep them associated with other socialising influences, because if that tie is cut they are vulnerable to other things. Just keep strengthening that tether," she says.

If in government, she will continue to champion the importance of the "soft" approach, of building social cohesion by empowering mosque leaders, strengthening families, supporting the discussion of terrorism in schools, and improving jobs and training for vulnerable youths.

As she orders an extra hot skim cappuccino, she reiterates it again. The answers are not rocket science.

"Some would say I'm too subjective or too emotional because this is such a personal topic for me," she says. "But it's OK to be driven by the passion for it. And the end of the day, this is kids we're talking about."

LIFE AND TIMES

1967 Born in Egypt

1969 Moves to Sydney's western suburbs

2001 Becomes a policy officer for the Western Australian government

2008 Completed PhD in perceptions of terrorism

2011 Inducted to Western Australian Women's Hall of Fame

2013 Finalist in Financial Review/Westpac 100 Women of Influence

2013 Starts People Against Violent Extremism

2014 Invited to speak on violent extremism at the White House

2015 Becomes a professor at Edith Cowan University

2016 Nominated for Australian of the Year

2016 Announces she will run as the federal Labor candidate in the seat of Cowan