ISIS terror plot against British Jews in Manchester foiled, 3 men convicted

A foiled ISIS-inspired terror plot targeting Manchester’s Jewish community has revived fears for Jewish security in Britain after three men were convicted on Tuesday of planning a weapons attack with mass casualties. English authorities said the Manchester case exposed a highly sophisticated ISIS-inspired terror plot that could have become the deadliest terrorist attack in British history.

Walid Saadaoui, 38, and Amar Hussein, 52, were convicted at Preston Crown Court of planning a gun attack on Jewish targets in Manchester. A third man, Saadaoui’s brother Bilel Saadaoui, 36, was convicted of failing to disclose information about the plot. Crown Prosecution Service (CPS).

Prosecutors said the men planned a marauding gun attack using military-style weapons. Saadaoui paid an initial down payment to purchase four AK-47 assault rifles, two handguns and hundreds of rounds of ammunition, with money he raised after selling his home and business. The plot was uncovered by an undercover police operation and Saadaoui was arrested while trying to take possession of weapons and ammunition, the CPS said.

MOSSAD – EUROPEAN INTELLIGENCE OPERATION LAUNCHES MAJOR CARE DOWNLOAD AGAINST HAMAS’ GLOBAL TERROR NETWORK

Rob Potts, deputy chief constable of Manchester Police, said the plan could have become ‘the deadliest terrorist attack in Britain’s history’. He warned that an attack on busy Jewish locations would have had “catastrophic” consequences, police said. Sky News.

According to the prosecutor, Saadaoui admired Hamid al-Abaoud, the ISIS operative who led the deadly terrorist attacks in Paris in 2015, and tried to emulate a similar style of mass murder. The court heard Saadaoui told an undercover officer he wanted to kill “young, old, women, elderly, all of them”, describing Christian victims as “a bonus”, Sky News reported.

Prosecutors said the men planned to move between locations and kill police officers who might respond to the attack. Saadaoui and Hussein also traveled to the White Cliffs of Dover in March and May 2024 to observe port security, believing they were monitoring how weapons would be brought into Britain, the CPS said.

The plot was disrupted on May 8, 2024, when Saadaoui was arrested while attempting to receive firearms and ammunition during the undercover operation. Sky News reported that police body-worn camera footage showed armed officers arresting him shortly after the handover.

POLAND AVOIDS ISIS-TYPE BOMB COMPLETE AS ATTACKED SYDNEY TERRORAL THREATERS IN UK, EUROPE

Surveillance photo of Walid Saadaoui, 38, and Amar Hussein, 52, pictured near Dover as they were found guilty at Preston Crown Court of plotting to kill hundreds of people in an Islamic State-inspired gun attack against Britain’s Jewish community, in this distributed surveillance photo from May 8, 2025. (Greater Manchester Police/Reuters)

Sky News also reported that intelligence sources said MI5 believed Saadaoui had previously been in contact with a British extremist who left Britain to join ISIS in 2013.

Prosecutor Harpreet Sandhu KC told the jury the plan “hardly had the innocence of a teddy bear picnic”, describing it as a deliberate attempt to cause mass civilian casualties, Sky News reported.

The foiled plot revived painful memories in a city that has already suffered from major terrorist attacks.

Manchester was the site of the 2017 Manchester Arena bombing, when an ISIS-inspired suicide bomber killed 22 people at a concert, the deadliest terror attack in Britain since July 7, 2007, one in London.

More recently, counter-terrorism police responded to an attack outside a synagogue in Manchester in October, when an attacker rammed pedestrians and stabbed worshipers during Yom Kippur services, killing two Jewish men. According to Reuters, British authorities have labeled the incident a terrorist attack.

ISIS, IRAN ESCALATES GLOBAL CAMPAIGN AGAINST JEWS, SAYS ISRAEL SPY CHIEF

Money seized from the home of Bilel Saadaoui, 36, who has been found guilty of failing to disclose information about terrorist acts, as two men, Walid Saadaoui, 38, and Amar Hussein, 52, were found guilty on Tuesday of plotting to kill hundreds in an Islamic State-inspired gun attack against Britain’s Jewish community, in this handout photo obtained by Reuters on December 23 2025. (Greater Manchester Police/presentation via Reuters)

The CPS said the foiled ISIS-inspired weapons plot targeted an area of ​​north Manchester mainly occupied by the Jewish community, raising concerns among security officials about the same population being repeatedly targeted.

The convictions come as new polls show a sharp deterioration in British Jews’ sense of security.

A survey published in December 2025 by the Campaign Against Antisemitism found that 51% of British Jews do not believe they have a long-term future in the UK. According to the poll, 61% said they had considered leaving the country in the past two years, citing anti-Semitism and security concerns.

Weapons seized from the home of Walid Saadaoui, 38, who was found guilty at Preston Crown Court of plotting to kill hundreds of people in an Islamic State-inspired weapons rampage against Britain’s Jewish community, in this courtesy photo obtained by Reuters on December 23, 2025. Greater Manchester. (Police/handout via Reuters)

CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP

The survey also found that 96% of respondents said Jews are less safe in Britain than before the October 7, 2023 Hamas terrorist attacks on Israel, while 59% said they avoid wearing visible signs of Jewish identity in public for fear of anti-Semitism.

Confidence in the police and the judiciary was also low. Only 14% of respondents said police do enough to protect Jewish communities, 8% said the justice system adequately punishes anti-Semitic crimes, and 7% said prosecutors do enough to bring offenders to justice, the Campaign Against Antisemitism reported.

Reuters contributed to this report.