The man who attacked a Manchester synagogue made an emergency call to police during the rampage to “pledge allegiance” to Islamic State group, UK counterterrorism police revealed on Wednesday.
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The attacker, identified as Jihad al-Shamie, 35, was shot dead by police within seven minutes of the attack, in which two Jewish people were killed – one likely by a stray police bullet.
But “in the initial stages of the attack … a call was made by the attacker to police claiming to pledge allegiance to the so-called Islamic State”, a spokesperson for Counter Terrorism Policing in northwest England said on Wednesday.
Adrian Daulby, 53, and Melvin Cravitz, 66, were both killed and three others seriously wounded in Thursday’s attack in the northwestern city on Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish calendar.
The attack on Heaton Park Hebrew Congregation Synagogue was one of the worst antisemitic incidents in Europe since the October 7, 2023, attack in Israel led by the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas.
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Four people, two men and two women, remain in custody for questioning after the attack by Shamie, a UK citizen of Syrian descent.