British police apologised Thursday for a “missed opportunity” to potentially prevent a deadly attack on a Manchester synagogue last year, as an associate of the attacker was sentenced to at least 17 years in prison for helping carry out reconnaissance at a U.K. defense site.
Mohammad Asim Bashir, 31, admitted last month to driving Jihad Al-Shamie to the U.K. Defence Academy in Oxfordshire in August 2025 to conduct hostile reconnaissance. Bashir was sentenced on Thursday, with the judge describing him as a “committed jihadist” who had enthusiastically planned a terrorist attack with Al-Shamie.
Messages between the two men included discussions of violence and revealed antisemitic views, prosecutors said.
Six weeks after their trip to Oxfordshire, Al-Shamie drove a car into pedestrians before attacking worshippers with a knife at the Heaton Park Hebrew Congregation Synagogue in Manchester. One Jewish worshipper was killed by stabbing, while another was accidentally shot dead by police.
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Members of a forensic team work outside the Manchester synagogue, where multiple people were killed on Yom Kippur in what police have declared a terrorist incident, in Manchester, October. Credit: Phil Noble/Reuters
Members of a forensic team work outside the Manchester synagogue, where multiple people were killed on Yom Kippur in what police have declared a terrorist incident, in Manchester, October. Credit: Phil Noble/Reuters
Al-Shamie, a 35-year-old British citizen of Syrian descent, told police he was acting on behalf of the Islamic State before officers shot him dead.
At Bashir’s sentencing hearing at Manchester Crown Court, prosecutors said Al-Shamie had been arrested twice before the attack – in February 2025 for allegedly breaching a non-molestation order and again in September over an alleged rape. His mobile devices were seized, but their contents were not examined until after the synagogue attack.
Greater Manchester Police Chief Constable Stephen Watson said he was “deeply sorry” that the force failed to review data from the devices that contained significant evidence of Al-Shamie’s mindset.
“It is clear that our not having reviewed the data available to us prior to the attack constitutes a missed opportunity,” Watson said.
Watson said the Independent Office for Police Conduct and the inquests into the deaths would determine the impact of not reviewing the contents of the devices.
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King Charles visiting the Heaton Park Hebrew Congregation synagogue in Manchester, where two members were killed in a terror attack, October. Credit: Chris Jackson/Reuters
King Charles visiting the Heaton Park Hebrew Congregation synagogue in Manchester, where two members were killed in a terror attack, October. Credit: Chris Jackson/Reuters
“There can, however, be little doubt that the information contained within these devices would have inspired further investigative action,” he added.
Bashir had driven Al-Shamie on a 10-hour round trip from Manchester to the U.K. Defence Academy, which provides defense and security education to armed forces and government personnel, in August 2025.
In October, Al-Shamie attacked the synagogue before calling police and saying: “I pledge allegiance to the Islamic State and I have killed two Jews.”