LONDON — Police declared a terrorist incident after two people were killed and three others were seriously injured Thursday when a man rammed a car into a crowd and stabbed people at a synagogue in the northern English city of Manchester.
Worshippers were observing Yom Kippur, the holiest day in the Jewish calendar.
Assistant Metropolitan Police Commissioner Laurence Taylor, the head of counterterrorism policing, told reporters the attack had been declared a terrorist incident.
He said police fatally shot the suspect, who was later identified as Jihad Al-Shamie, 35, a British citizen of Syrian descent.
Two people were killed at the Heaton Park Hebrew Congregation Synagogue in Crumpsall, and three others were in “serious condition,” he said.
On Friday, police identified the two people killed as Adrian Daulby, 53, and Melvin Cravitz, 66, both from Crumpsall.
One sustained a stab wound, and another was hit by the car in the attack. A third man arrived at the hospital “with an injury that may have been sustained as officers stopped the attacker,” police said Thursday.
“Those who have been killed, injured, are at the forefront of our minds, as [are] their families, friends and all of those who love them,” Taylor said. He said that attack on the Jewish community “on Yom Kippur is devastating.”
Three people have been arrested; police did not identify them. They were described as two men in their 30s and a woman in her 60s.
London's Metropolitan Police, which is responsible for dealing with all counterterrorism investigations throughout the U.K., has taken over the investigation from Greater Manchester Police (GMP), which initially dealt with the incident.
GMP said earlier that it could not confirm the suspect’s death because of “suspicious items” on the body, which were being dealt with by bomb disposal officers. He was wearing a vest that gave the appearance of an explosive device, but police later determined it was not a viable threat.
The force first posted on X that officers were responding to calls at the synagogue in Crumpsall at 9:31 a.m. local time (4:31 a.m. ET).
The attacker drove directly at members of the public outside the synagogue before he attacked people with a knife, GMP Chief Constable Sir Stephen Watson said at the news conference where Taylor spoke.
Watson said worshippers prevented the attacker from gaining access to the synagogue.
Within seven minutes of the attack, police shot and killed the suspect, Watson said.
“We can confirm that two members of our Jewish community have sadly died as a result of this attack,” he said.
A video uploaded to social media, which was verified by NBC News, shows a man lying on the ground outside the synagogue while two officers point their guns at him. When the man tries to get up. an officer fires a single round.
The video shows a man wearing a Jewish yarmulke lying in a pool of blood just yards away.
Watson said it “will take time” to understand the full circumstances of the attack.
In a separate post on X, GMP said a large number of worshippers were kept inside the synagogue right after the attack but have since been allowed to leave.
Taylor, of the Metropolitan Police, said patrols at synagogues and other Jewish sites had increased across the country. Police were “mobilizing fast,” he said.
"At counterterrorism police, we’re deploying all of our capabilities in response to what has happened, and we have resources from across our network involved," Taylor added.
Prime Minister Keir Starmer, who was at a European summit in Denmark's capital, Copenhagen, traveled back to London to chair a meeting of COBRA, the U.K.'s emergency response committee.
Starmer described the attacker as a "vile individual" who attacked Jews "because they are Jews." Britain is a country that "stands up to hatred" and welcomed many Jewish families after World War II, he said in his address to the country.
But it is also a place where Jewish communities require round-the-clock protection, he continued.
"And while this is not a new hate — this is something Jews have always lived with — we must be clear," Starmer said. "It is a hatred that is rising once again, and Britain must defeat it once again."
He expressed solidarity and sadness with the Jewish community, promising a more visible police presence to protect them.
The Israeli Embassy in London also condemned the attack in a statement. “That such an act of violence should be perpetrated on the holiest day of the Jewish calendar, in a place of prayer and community, is abhorrent and deeply distressing,” it said.
King Charles III said in a statement that he and Queen Camilla were “deeply shocked and saddened to learn of the horrific attack in Manchester, especially on such a significant day for the Jewish community.”
The Community Security Trust, a Jewish charity that provides security services, said it was "working with police and the local Jewish community."
Graham Stringer, the member of Parliament who represents the area, said in a statement that it was a “dreadful attack designed to damage the Jewish community and damage inter-faith and inter-community relationships.”
He said Mancunians, the term for people from Manchester, would come together just as they did after the Manchester Arena bombing in 2017, in which 22 people died following an Ariana Grande concert.
