Two members of the Jewish community who were barricading a synagogue as it was being attacked by a knifeman may have been shot through the door by police taking out the alleged terrorist, it has been revealed.
Armed officers responding to an ongoing terror attack may have inadvertently killed one innocent victim and wounded another through overpenetration of rounds intended for the perpetrator, Greater Manchester Police have said.
On Thursday, a man now identified as what police describe as a “British citizen of Syrian descent” called Jihad Al-Shamie drove a car into worshippers outside the Heaton Park Hebrew Congregation Synagogue in north Manchester. 35-year-old Al-Shamie dismounted the car and drew a knife, which he used to attack others, including a security guard.
Worshippers at the synagogue were praised by authorities for acting quickly to shut and lock the front door of the building, leaving Al-Shamie unable to get inside. He was attempting to use his knife to stab through a window when police arrived minutes later.
Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer speaks with emergency responders during a visit to the Heaton Park Hebrew Congregation synagogue in Crumpsall, Manchester, where two people died in a terror attack on Thursday. Picture date: Friday October 3, 2025. (Photo by Peter Byrne/PA Images via Getty Images)
Officers ordered Al-Shamie to surrender but he refused, leading to him being shot. After he tried to get up, and with fears he was wearing an explosive vest, he was shot again, this time fatally.
But rounds fired by police attempting to take down the alleged terrorist appear to have overpenetrated or missed, and caused injuries on the other side of the Synagogue’s outer walls.
Chief Constable of Greater Manchester Police, Sir Stephen Watson said: “Overnight, we have taken advice from the Home Office Pathologist ahead of full post mortem examinations scheduled for later today. The Home Office Pathologist has advised that he has provisionally determined, that one of the deceased victims would appear to have suffered a wound consistent with a gunshot injury.”
Explaining attacker Al-Shamie did not have a gun and the only people known to have discharged a firearm at the scene were the responding officers, the top officer acknowledged the injuries had most likely been caused by police. He said: “It follows therefore, that subject to further forensic examination, this injury may sadly have been sustained as a tragic and unforeseen consequence of the urgently required action taken by my officers to bring this vicious attack to an end.”
Watson said one of the three non-fatal injuries sustained at the scene also suffered a bullet wound. He said this person’s injury is “mercifully not life threatening”, and added: “It is believed that both victims were close together behind the synagogue door, as worshippers acted bravely to prevent the attacker from gaining entry.”
Also on Friday morning Manchester Police named the deceased victims of Thursday morning’s attack as 53-year-old Adrian Daulby and 66-year-old Melvin Cravitz, both members of the local Jewish community. Three other locals are receiving hospital treatment and are said to be in serious condition.
More details are emerging about attacker Jihad Al-Shamie, whose forename is an Arabic-Islamic term with a hotly contested meaning, and whose surname translates as ‘The Syrian’. Al-Shamie is understood to have been born in Syria and migrated to the United Kingdom as a child, and was granted British citizenship in 2006, GB News reported. It is further stated that authorities are not sure whether Jihad Al-Shamie is his birth name or if it was later changed.
The Daily Telegraph has spoken to some of Al-Shamie’s neighbours, on a street a five minute drive from the scene of the attack. They told the paper he lived with his mother at the address and had done these past 15 years, and was not sociable with others from the street. One said: “He lived there 10 years, with no wife or kids that could see. He never seemed to speak to anyone around here.
“I recognised him from the pictures of the attacker. I recognised his little car, the Kia, because he’d always park it badly outside ours. I’d see him walking around in his pyjamas and slip-on sandals, carrying a shopping bag.”
Counter Terrorism Policing, who took over the investigation yesterday, said they arrested three people “on suspicion of commission, preparation and instigation of acts of terrorism” but that it was stil unclear whether Al-Shamie had worked alone or as part of a cell. They said Al-Shamie was not previously known to police or the counter-radicalisation reporting system and programme Prevent.
The officers said in the statement that they hadn’t yet succeeded in figuring out what the motivation of the Syrian migrant male to attack a Synagogue is, but they are “working to understand”.
Read the full article here