A terrorist identified by police as Jihad al-Shamie, of Syrian descent, killed two and injured three others in a car ramming and stabbing attack outside a U.K. synagogue on Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish calendar.
Al-Shamie, who entered the United Kingdom as a child and became a British citizen in 2006, drove a vehicle into a crowd outside Manchester’s Heaton Park Synagogue at around 9:30 a.m. local time, then got out and stabbed a bystander, according to the Wall Street Journal and the Guardian. Police killed the assailant and have since arrested three individuals—two men in their 30s and a woman in her 60s—in connection with the incident, the New York Times reported.
Authorities have declared the incident a terrorist attack, BBC reported. Video footage shows an officer shouting "he has a bomb" and telling members of the public to move away from the attacker.
The synagogue, about three miles north of the city center, sits in Manchester’s northern suburbs, which are home to a large Jewish community.
"Police forces are stepping up patrols across the country at synagogues and Jewish sites and more widely to provide reassurance to all those communities who have been affected," the head of the U.K.’s counterterrorism policing, Laurence Taylor, said at a news conference, according to the Times.
"The fact that this has taken place on Yom Kippur, the holiest day in the Jewish calendar, makes it all the more horrific," U.K. prime minister Keir Starmer wrote in an X post. "My thoughts are with the loved ones of all those affected."
Starmer, on Sept. 21, announced the United Kingdom's recognition of a Palestinian state with no conditions. The move was denounced by the families of Israeli hostages who said it "dramatically complicated efforts to bring home our loved ones."
The terrorist attack comes amid a surge in anti-Semitism across Europe. The United Kingdom had 1,500 anti-Semitic incidents in the first half of 2025, second only to the first six months of last year, according to the Community Security Trust. The European Commission likewise reported last year that "the conflicts in the Middle East have led to levels of antisemitism unprecedented since the founding of the European Union."
German police on Wednesday arrested three suspected Hamas members for allegedly procuring weapons to carry out "assassinations targeting Israeli or Jewish institutions." In February, four other suspected members of Hamas went on trial in Berlin for plotting attacks on Jewish institutions across Europe.
President Donald Trump has cracked down on rising anti-Semitism in the United States by withholding billions in federal funding from universities that fail to protect Jewish students on campus and revoking visas of foreign nationals linked to anti-Semitic activity.
"The antisemitic rhetoric that has been spewed by Hamas terrorist sympathizers has provided these terrorist groups with the space to invoke terror on the Jewish people," Rep. Rick Crawford (R., Ark.), chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee, said in a statement provided to the Washington Free Beacon.
"This should serve as another not-so-gentle reminder to the United States about what happens when you allow terrorist agendas any room to operate within your country," Crawford added.
