Police have been accused of failing to protect the Jewish community from Iran-backed “thugs for hire” after another firebomb attack on a synagogue. The Telegraph has the story.
Jewish leaders warned antisemitism in the UK was “gathering momentum” after a projectile was thrown through a window at the Kenton United Synagogue in Harrow, north London.
Harakat Ashab al-Yamin al-Islamiyya (HAYI), an Islamist militant group, said it was behind the attack.
It has now claimed responsibility for five incidents targeting Jewish sites in London, including the firebombing of four ambulances in Golders Green in March and a botched drone attack on the Israeli embassy last week.
Counter-terror police believe the group could be linked to the Iranian regime and recruiting assailants online with no allegiance to their cause by using “quick cash”.
Activists from the Jewish community said authorities had failed to tackle extremism despite Sir Keir Starmer promising in December to root out the “poison” of antisemitism in the UK.
A spokesman for the Campaign Against Antisemitism said: “It betrays a cataclysmic failure of the state – politicians, police chiefs and prosecutors – to tackle antisemitic extremism in this country, which has gone largely unchecked for two and a half years. Britain is fundamentally a different country now.”
The charity urged the Government to proscribe the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) as an “obvious first step to address foreign radicalisation and interference”.
The spokesman added: “It is shocking that concern for the sensitivities of a violent Iranian regime is more important to the Government than the welfare of Jewish people in this country.”
Sir Ephraim Mirvis, the Chief Rabbi, condemned the “cowardly arson attack” and said: “A sustained campaign of violence and intimidation against the Jewish community of the UK is gathering momentum”.
He added: “This sustained attack on our community’s ability to worship and live in safety is an attack on the values that bind us all together.”
The attack on the synagogue in Harrow is believed to have occurred at about 11.30pm on Saturday night when a bottle “with some sort of accelerant” was thrown through the window of a medical room.
Scotland Yard said that officers patrolling the area in light of the recent attacks had noticed damage to the window around midnight and saw smoke inside the building.
The London Fire Brigade was called and searched the building to confirm that there was no further fire risk, although the medical room was left badly damaged.
Hours after the attack, HAYI, which is believed to have been formed last month following the start of the Iran war, appeared to claim responsibility in an online video.
The group, whose logo features a raised fist holding a rifle, posted a video appearing to show a figure clad in black throwing something through a window of the synagogue before running away as flames could be seen inside.
In its post on the Telegram app, it described the synagogue as “one of the centres of Zionist influence in the British capital” and accused it of supporting “the crimes of the occupying regime in Jerusalem”.
Security sources have expressed doubts that HAYI is a terror group in the traditional sense of the word, such as al-Qaeda or Hezbollah, which have clear organisational structures.
Instead, they suggested that HAYI was a banner to claim responsibility for a number of incidents across Europe, some of which could be opportunistic.
Worth reading in full.
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While the few attacks on Jewish synagogues in Britain are always featured in the mainstream media, the THOUSANDS of attacks on Christian churches in Britain are largely ignored. It seems a bit strange. Scotland refused the Freedom of Information request on the number of churches vandalized in Scotland … perhaps at the behest of all the Muslims & Communists in the Scottish government?
Arson attacks cause millions of pounds of damage | News | Ecclesiastical
Over 9,000 crimes reported at UK churches in just three years | National Churches Trust
Churches vandalised eight times a day across England and Wales
The police should of course do its best to protect, although it’s scope is limited and should be. Who wants to live in a police state?
However, what should be done is that violent attacks of any serious nature like this should be investigated, perpetrators found and severely punished.
But of course, that will probably not happen if the police are busy arresting essentially harmless people for expressing opinions and judges refuse to punish properly anyone who isn’t white.
The political elites have enabled and encouraged some very nasty groups in our country. Have the Greens yet given their views on this and was it unanimous in the party.
Maybe if they did not waste time trying to find Far Right extremists that do not exist they could focus on the real threat – muslim terrorism.