{"id":366698,"date":"2026-03-31T00:46:36","date_gmt":"2026-03-31T00:46:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/366698\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T00:46:36","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T00:46:36","slug":"michigan-synagogue-attack-was-hezbollah-inspired-act-of-terrorism-fbi-says","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/366698\/","title":{"rendered":"Michigan synagogue attack was Hezbollah-inspired act of terrorism, FBI says"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n The attack earlier this month on a synagogue in West Bloomfield, Michigan<\/a>, was \u201ca Hezbollah-inspired act of terrorism purposely targeting the Jewish community and the largest Jewish temple in Michigan,\u201d the FBI said in a news conference Monday.\n <\/p>\n

\n The assailant, Ayman Ghazali<\/a>, a naturalized US citizen from Lebanon, rammed a pickup truck into the synagogue on March 12, as more than 100 children were attending school inside.\n <\/p>\n

\n After waiting in the synagogue\u2019s parking lot for more than two hours, authorities said, Ghazali drove the truck far into the building \u2013 hitting a security officer \u2013 before the vehicle became wedged in a hallway.\n <\/p>\n

\n Security officers for the synagogue began exchanging gunfire<\/a> with Ghazali, who eventually shot and killed himself inside the truck. During the chaos, the truck\u2019s engine compartment caught fire and caused extensive damage to the building. The truck was filled with over $2,000 of commercial-grade fireworks<\/a> and about 35 gallons of gasoline, which he used to \u201cenhance\u201d the explosion, said Jennifer Runyan, the FBI\u2019s special agent in charge in Detroit.\n <\/p>\n

\n No one else was killed. One of the temple\u2019s lead security officers<\/a> was injured after being hit by the vehicle.\n <\/p>\n

\"Smoke<\/p>\n

\n There is no evidence that Ghazali had co-conspirators, Runyan said.\n <\/p>\n

\n Had he lived, he would have been charged with providing material support to Hezbollah, the Iranian-backed terrorist group in Lebanon, said Jerome Gorgon, US attorney for the Eastern District of Michigan.\n <\/p>\n

\n Gorgon added Ghazali was inspired by Hezbollah propaganda to carry out the attack.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cThis man acted under Hezbollah\u2019s direction and control,\u201d Gorgon said. \u201cHe intended to kill others, not just himself.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\n In the days after the attack, US officials said Ghazali was located in federal government databases as having connections to \u201cknown or suspected terrorists\u201d associated with Hezbollah.\n <\/p>\n

\n A week prior to the attack, members of Ghazali\u2019s family in Lebanon \u2013 including two brothers \u2013 were killed in an Israeli airstrike<\/a> as the US and Israel entered its second week of conflict with Iran.\n <\/p>\n

\n The Israeli military said one of his brothers, Ibrahim Muhammad Ghazali, was a Hezbollah commander in charge of managing weapons operations in the Iranian proxy group\u2019s Badr unit.\n <\/p>\n

\n Ghazali began planning for the attack days earlier, the FBI said, with his plans intensifying on March 9. A review of Ghazali\u2019s online activity dating to January showed repeated searches for pro\u2011Hezbollah and Iranian news outlets, as well as videos related to gunfire and ammunition.\n <\/p>\n

\n Beginning March 9, the FBI said, he closely followed speeches and live coverage involving Hezbollah\u2019s secretary general, Naim Qassem, along with reporting about an Iranian fatwa \u2013 a religious ruling concerning Islamic law \u2013 calling for total jihad against the US military.\n <\/p>\n

\n He also researched Jewish cultural educational and religious centers throughout the Detroit metro area, viewed multiple pages of upcoming events at Temple Israel<\/a> and searched specific terms and phrases such as \u201cthe largest gathering of Israelis in Michigan,\u201d \u201cOrthodox synagogues\u201d and \u201cIsraelis near me,\u201d Runyan said.\n <\/p>\n

\n That day, after two people declined to sell him a weapon, Ghazali bought an AR-style rifle, 10 magazines and about 300 rounds of ammunition at a gun store in Dearborn Heights, Runyan said.\n <\/p>\n

\n He practiced shooting the new weapon the next day and bought the fireworks, Runyan said.\n <\/p>\n

\"An<\/p>\n

\n An order of dozens of water containers arrived on the 11th \u2013 the day before the attack \u2013 and he immediately started filling them with gasoline, making four trips to gas stations so he would not arouse suspicion, Runyan said. He also bought two torch lighters, which authorities believe he used to set his truck on fire.\n <\/p>\n

\n On the day of the attack, Ghazali sent his sister, who authorities believe lives in Lebanon, numerous videos and messages \u201caffirming his Hezbollah-inspired ideology,\u201d Runyan said.\n <\/p>\n

\n Ten minutes before he drove his truck into the synagogue, Ghazali sent his sister two videos in Arabic indicating he was at the largest gathering of Israelis in the state of Michigan, had booby-trapped his car and would forcibly enter and start shooting people, the FBI said.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cGod willing, I will kill as many of them as I possibly can,\u201d Ghazali recorded himself saying, according to Runyan.\n <\/p>\n

\n This story has been updated.\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The attack earlier this month on a synagogue in West Bloomfield, Michigan, was \u201ca Hezbollah-inspired act of terrorism…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":366699,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[42,43,40,38,41,39],"class_list":{"0":"post-366698","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-top-news","11":"tag-top-stories","12":"tag-topnews","13":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/366698","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=366698"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/366698\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/366699"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=366698"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=366698"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=366698"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}