Manchester, England – One of the two men killed in a car and knife attack against a synagogue in the English city of Manchester seems to have been accidentally killed by a police officer while the faithful tried to prevent the attacker from entering the building, the authorities of the law enforcement announced on Friday.
The police said that local residents Adrian Daulby, 53, and Melvin Cravitz, 66, died during the attack on the synagogue of the Congregation of Heaton Park in the suburbs of Manchester in Crumpsall on Thursday. Three other people are hospitalized in serious condition.
“Find out more: The man kills 2 by car cutting and stabbing at the English synagogue on the Holy Jewish day
The police pulled and killed a suspect seven minutes after hitting a car in pedestrians outside the synagogue, then attacked them with a knife in what the police called an act of terrorism. He wore what seemed to be a belt of explosives, which turned out to be false.
Grand Manchester police chief Stephen Watson said that a pathologist has temporarily determined that one of the people killed had been shot. Since the attacker did not have a pistol, he said that the injury may have been “a tragic and unforeseen consequence” of police actions.
He said one of the hospitalized victims also seems to have been shot.
“It is believed that the two victims were close to each other behind the synagogue door, while the faithful acted courageously to prevent the attacker from entering,” said Watson.
The assault took place while people gathered at the Orthodox synagogue on Yom Kippour, the day of expiation and the most solemn day of the Jewish calendar.
The Rabbi Chef Ephraim Mirvis, the chief of Orthodox Judaism in Great Britain, said that the attack was the result of an “relentless Jewish hatred” in the streets and online.
“It is the day we hoped that we would never see, but which, basically, we knew, would come,” he wrote on social networks.
The striker was not known to the police
Police identified the striker as Jihad Al-Shamie, a 35-year-old British citizen of Syrian origin who entered the United Kingdom as a young child and became a citizen in 2006. Al-Shamia translates into English as “the Syrian”, and the authorities do not know if it is his birth name.
Police said the crime was investigated as a terrorist attack. Interior secretary, Shabana Mahmood, said that the striker was not previously known to the police or to prevent a program to combat terrorism which are trying to identify people at risk of radicalization.
Mahmood said, “It is too early to say” if the attacker acted alone or was part of a cell, and the police said that they still sounded the reason. The police arrested two men in the thirties and a woman in sixties suspected of the preparation or the commission of acts of terrorism in relation to the attack.
The neighbors of the striker in the suburb of Manchester of Prestwich, a few kilometers (about 3 kilometers) from the synagogue, said that the Al-Shamie family lived in the house for years. Several have described by seeing Al-Shamia raise weights and work in the backyard.
Geoff Halliwell, who lives nearby, said that he seemed to be “an ordinary and simple boy”.
A declaration on Facebook of the attacker’s family condemned “the odious act, which targeted peaceful and innocent civilians.
“Our hearts and our thoughts go to the victims and their families, and we pray for their strength and their comfort,” said the press release.
Religious leaders condemn the attack
Religious and political leaders condemned the attack and have committed to reassuring the British Jewish community, which has around 300,000.
Police said additional officers would be on the streets of Manchester on Friday and weekends.
Prime Minister Keir Starmer, who visited the attack on Friday morning with his wife Victoria, said: “It was a terrible attack, a terrorist attack to inflict fear. Attack the Jews because they are Jews.
“It is really important today that the whole country meets, people of all confessions and without faith, support themselves and solidarity with our Jewish community,” he said.
Bishop Anglican Sarah Mullally, who was appointed Friday as the next church of the Church of England, said that “hatred and racism of all kinds cannot be allowed to tear us away”.
The anti-Semitic incidents recorded in the United Kingdom have increased sharply since October 7, 2023 of Hamas, the attack on the War of Israel and Israel against Hamas in Gaza, according to Community Security Trust, a charitable organization which provides advice and protection to British Jews. More than 1,500 incidents have been reported in the first half, said the second highest of six months since the record for the same period a year earlier.
Calls on to cancel pro-Palestinian demonstrations to cancel
Some politicians and religious leaders have said that pro-Palestinian demonstrations, which have taken place regularly since the start of the war in Gaza, had played a role in the spread of the hatred of the Jews. Some say that songs such as “from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” encourage violence. Others, including Jews who support the demonstrations, say they want a cease-fire, the end of the suffering of the Palestinians in Gaza and the release of Israeli hostages held by Hamas.
Mirvis, chief Rabbi, urged the authorities to “seize these demonstrations.” They are dangerous ”.
Mahmood, the Minister of the Interior, said that 40 people were arrested Thursday evening during demonstrations organized in response to the interception of the Israeli navy of a flotilla trying to break the Israeli Gaza blocking.
She said he was “dishonorable” that the demonstrations had not been canceled after the Manchester attack.
London police urged the organizers to cancel a demonstration scheduled for Saturday to oppose the prohibition on the action of the Palestine group, which was qualified as a terrorist organization by the government.
The organizers said they would not cancel the demonstration, during which hundreds of people should hold panels supporting the prohibited group.
“The cancellation of peaceful protests allows Terror to win,” the group said in a statement.
Source link
#British #police #accidentally #shot #victim #attack #Manchester #synagogue
