The suspect behind the deadly car and mesterror attack outside a synagogue in Manchester in the United Kingdom was identified by the police on Thursday as Jihad al-Shamie, a 35-year-old British citizen of Syrian origin.
The police said that Al-Shamie came into the United Kingdom like a young child and became a citizen in 2006. He did not have a criminal record before. Al-Shamia translates in English as ‘the Syrian’, and the authorities are not sure if that is his birth name.
The metropolitan police in London declared the attack a terrorist attack. It came to Yom Kippur, the holiest day in the Jewish calendar, when large crowds gathered in Heaton Park Hebrew Synagogue, an Orthodox Synagogue.
The exact motive of the attacker is still being investigated by the police.
Emergency services guide people in safety after a car and knife terror attack outside Heaton Park Hebrew Synagogue in Manchester, England, Thursday, October 2, 2025. The police said two people were killed and four others were injured before armed officers shot the suspect. (Christopher Furlong/Getty images)
British terror attack outside of packed synagogue on Yom Kippur lets 2 dead, 4 injured, the police say
Neighbors of the attacker in the suburb of Manchester of Prestwich, a few miles of the synagogue, said that the Al-Shamia family had lived there in a house for years. Several described seeing al-Shamie raising weights and training in the back garden.
Geoff Halliwell, who lives in the neighborhood, told The Associated Press that he seemed to be “a simple, ordinary boy”.
Al-Shamie is accused of ramming a car in pedestrians outside the synagogue around 9:30 am local time and then attacking with a knife. He wore what an explosion strap seemed to be, which turned out to be fake.
Armed police declared a major incident and opened the fire minutes later, killing the suspect.
Two people died and four others were injured during the incident.
Two women cuddle firmly, one crying, near the attack scene of Manchester Synagogue. (Christopher Furlong/Getty images)
In an update, the police said that al-Shamia was not armed and that one of the deceased victims was a shot wound that was probably during the reaction of the police rifle. A victim admitted to the hospital also suffered a shot wound, the police said.
The dead victims were mentioned as Adrian Daulby, 53, and Melvin Cravitz, 66, both from Crumpsall.
The police arrested three people on Thursday on suspicion of the preparation or the Commission of Terrorist Acts. They are two men in the thirty and one woman in the 60s.
Video on social media showed the police with guns aimed at a person on the asphalt under a blue star of David on the brick building.
Several people who were killed in the shooting attack on the Jerusalem bus
A bystander could be heard on the video that the man had a bomb and tried to press a button. When the man tried to get up, a shot sounded and he fell to the floor, flopped on his back and then rolled on his side.
In a television on television, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer described the attack as a “mean terrorist attack that Jews attacked because they are Jews.”
“Anti -Semitism is a hatred that rises again. Great Britain has to beat it again,” said Starmer. “For every Jewish person in this country: I promise that I will do everything in my power to guarantee the safety you deserve.”
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Anti -Semitic incidents in the UK increased after Hamas’ on October 7, 2023, attack on Israel and the subsequent military campaign of Israel in Gaza, according to Community Security Trust, an interest group for British Jews working to eliminate anti -Semitism.
More than 1500 incidents were reported in the first half of the year, the second highest reported since the record a year earlier.
