A 41-year-old man was killed on Thursday after ramming his pickup truck into a synagogue on the outskirts of Detroit, Michigan, causing a blaze and triggering a huge police response.
US media reported the assailant had recently lost family members in an Israeli strike in Lebanon, as part of the ongoing Middle East war.
A spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security identified the assailant as Ayman Mohamad Ghazali, who was born in Lebanon, came to Detroit in 2011 on a visa granted to spouses of US citizens, and became a US citizen himself in 2016.
Security guards opened fire on Ghazali after he smashed a truck through the doors of the Temple Israel synagogue in West Bloomfield, Oakland County Sheriff Michael Bouchard told reporters.
At a news conference on Thursday evening, Bouchard said no synagogue staff or children were hurt in the attack, but 30 law enforcement officers were “taken to the hospital for smoke inhalation” after the evacuation efforts. Earlier, he said one security guard was injured by the assailant’s truck.
The FBI will investigate the incident “as a targeted act of violence against the Jewish community,” Jennifer Runyan, special agent in charge of the federal agency’s Detroit field office, told reporters Thursday.
Law enforcement has not yet publicly detailed a motive.
US President Donald Trump called the attack “terrible”.
A neighbour told the Detroit Free Press newspaper Ghazali “recently lost family in an Israeli strike in Lebanon”.
A source in Michigan’s Lebanese American community also told CBS News the strike occurred “roughly 10 days prior” and “killed several of his family members, leaving him devastated.”
The attack comes amid heightened security across the United States following the launch nearly two weeks ago of the US-Israeli war on Iran, a conflict that has since broadened to the Middle East.
In Lebanon, authorities on Thursday said 687 people have been killed by Israel’s attacks, while Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said those strikes were “expanding”.
The synagogue attack also came on the same day as a shooting at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Virginia, which FBI Director Kash Patel said was being investigated as “an act of terrorism.”
Patel, in a post on X, said the university attack left one person dead and two others wounded. “The shooter is now deceased thanks to a group of brave students who stepped in and subdued him,” he said.
That suspect was later identified as Mohamed Bailor Jalloh, a former member of the National Guard who pleaded guilty in 2016 to attempting to provide material support to the militant Islamic State.
Single assailant
Bouchard said the Michigan assailant rammed the Temple Israel building with his vehicle and then drove down a hallway, where he was engaged by security guards.
“We can’t say what killed him at this point, but security did engage the suspect with gunfire,” the sheriff said.
He added that the assailant appeared to be alone in the vehicle and that police dogs were checking the car for explosives.
“It’s been complicated because there’s some fire,” he said. “We’re through an abundance of caution, clearing the vehicle for IEDs or any explosives.” Smoke could be seen billowing from Temple Israel, one of the largest Reform Judaism congregations in the country, after the attack.
‘Shocked’
Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer condemned what she called a “heartbreaking” attack.
“Michigan’s Jewish community should be able to live and practice their faith in peace,” she said. “Antisemitism and violence have no place in Michigan.”
Bouchard said Oakland County law enforcement will boost vigilance, and had already been on high alert since the start of the US-Israeli war on Iran nearly two weeks ago.
“We’ve been talking for two weeks about the potential, sadly, of this happening,” Bouchard said. “So there was no lack of preparation.”
