The FBI is investigating a car ramming attack on a large Detroit-area synagogue Thursday as a “targeted act of violence against the Jewish community,” the special agent in charge for the region said.
The Department of Homeland Security said the driver was Ayman Mohamad Ghazali, 41, a U.S. citizen originally from Lebanon.
Numerous federal and state law enforcement officials said that while they believe Ghazali is the alleged attacker, they are awaiting forensics to confirm the identity because the driver’s body is so badly burned.
The driver was killed by security staff members at Temple Israel synagogue in West Bloomfield Township, officials said. A preschool was in session at the temple, which is in a suburb around 30 miles northwest of downtown Detroit, but no children or school staff members were injured, officials said.
West Bloomfield Township Police Chief Dale Young said a 911 call at 12:19 p.m. reported “an active shooter situation at Temple Israel where the individual drove into the building.”
“Temple security officers engaged the individual and neutralized the threat,” Young said at news conference Thursday afternoon.
A motive remained under investigation, officials said.
DHS said Ghazali was born in Lebanon and entered the U.S. via Detroit on May 10, 2011. He entered on an IR1 immigrant visa as the spouse of a U.S. citizen after “alien relative and fiancé petitions filed in December 2009 were approved in April 2010,” DHS said.
He had applied for naturalization on October 2015 and was granted U.S. citizenship in February 2016, DHS said.
“All of us have thoughts of maybe why this happened,” Oakland County Sheriff Mike Bouchard said at the news conference. “But we don’t operate in a world where we can presume something. We have to determine it through investigation.”
Temple Israel said 140 students were in its early childhood center at the time of the attack.
“We are deeply and humbly grateful to our teachers, staff, security, law enforcement, and Shenendoah Country Club that welcomed us, fed us, and sheltered our staff, teachers, children, and parents. What incredible neighbors we have. What incredible police force we have,” it said in a statement on Facebook.
The head of security was taken to a hospital after the car knocked him down, Bouchard said. About 30 law enforcement officers were treated for smoke inhalation from a fire at the building that started after the car was driven into the building, Bouchard said.
“That building became engulfed,” he said, adding that how and why the fire started would be part of the investigation. “It caused terrible, terrible smoke in that part of the building.”
The FBI is leading the investigation in the attack, which it considers “a targeted act of violence against the Jewish community,” said Jennifer Runyan, the special agent in charge of the FBI’s Detroit field division.
The incident happened amid rising incidents of antisemitism and in the midst of a war between the U.S. and Israel and Iran, which began with U.S. and Israeli strikes late last month.
Steven Ingber, CEO of the Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Detroit, said Jews would not change their behavior.
“This is a tough time,” Ingber said at the news conference, and he thanked the security staff and police. “But we will get through this. We will get through this together. We will get through this stronger, and we will continue to be loud and proud of being Jewish. This will not change us.”
Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer called the attack “every community’s worst nightmare.”
“We saw incredible people step up today to save lives and stop the suspect. Our state is grateful to the security personnel for their bravery and law enforcement who jumped into action to keep students safe,” she said on X.
Temple Israel is a Reform synagogue that has 3,500 families, or more than 12,000 people, as members, it says on its website.
It was organized in 1941 and met at a sanctuary in Detroit but moved to West Bloomfield, a suburb of the city, with the completion of a new building in 1980.
