British police said Thursday that two people had been killed and three been injured in an attack outside a synagogue in the north of Manchester, England.
In a series of posts on X, Greater Manchester Police said they were called to the Heaton Park Hebrew Congregation Synagogue in Crumpsall shortly after 9:30 a.m. local time by a member of the public. The caller said he had witnessed a car being driven toward members of the public and that one man had been stabbed.
Police said that minutes later shots were fired by officers.
The Greater Manchester Police said they believe the suspect is dead but that fact “cannot currently be confirmed due to safety issues surround suspicious items on his person.” The force’s bomb disposal unit has responded to the scene.
Police said the injured are in serious condition without elaborating. Worshippers inside the synagogue were not among the injured.
“We are grateful to the member of the public whose quick response to what they witnessed allowed our swift action, and as a result the offender was prevented from entering the synagogue,” a police spokesperson said in a social media post.
Chava Lewin, who lives next to the synagogue, said she heard a bang and thought it might be a firework until her husband ran inside their house and said there had been an attack.
A witness told her that she saw a car driving erratically crash into the gates of the house of worship.
“She thought maybe he had a heart attack,” Lewin said. “The second he got out of the car he started stabbing anyone near him. He went for the security guard and tried to break into the synagogue.”
U.K. government to hold emergency meeting
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said additional police officers would be deployed at synagogues across the U.K.
Starmer, in Copenhagen for a summit, in a social media post thanked first responders and said his thoughts were with the victims and their loved ones.
“I’m appalled by the attack at a synagogue in Crumpsall,” said Starmer. “The fact that this has taken place on Yom Kippur, the holiest day in the Jewish calendar, makes it all the more horrific.”
Starmer was flying back from the summit to chair a meeting of the government’s emergency committee, COBRA.
Dave Rich of the Community Security Trust, a charity that monitors antisemitism in the U.K., said Yom Kippur is the holiest day of the Jewish year. “It’s a very solemn day and synagogues across the country will be full throughout the day,” he said.
He said there is “always a significant security operation in place” between police and the trust across the Jewish community on all major Jewish festivals.
Manchester was the site of Britain’s deadliest attack in recent years, the 2017 suicide bombing at an Ariana Grande concert that killed 22 people.
