One of the victims of the UK terrorist attack was accidentally shot and killed by the police 

Officials said one of the men killed at the Heaton Park Congregation synagogue in northwestern England had been hit by police gunfire.

 

Residents were left in shock after a driver rammed a vehicle into people and stabbed others Thursday at a synagogue in Manchester. Three people died, including the attacker. The police on Friday said one victim died from police gunfire, reports New York Times.

 

One of the victims killed during Thursday’s terrorist attack at a British synagogue was accidentally shot by a police officer, officials said on Friday.

 

The attack took place began when a man rammed his car into people outside the synagogue, Heaton Park Congregation, in Manchester, England, and then went on a stabbing spree.

 

On Thursday night, counterterrorism police identified the attacker as Jihad al-Shamie, 35, a British citizen of Syrian descent. He was fatally shot by the police within minutes of the attack.

 

Two men were killed and three others were injured and remained hospitalized after the attack, which came on Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish calendar, adding to fears about the safety of Jews around the world amid a rising wave of antisemitism.

 

Adrian Daulby, 53, and Melvin Cravitz, 66, died from injuries sustained during the assault on the synagogue, the police said on Friday morning.

 

The police did not immediately specify which of the deceased victims had been accidentally shot by an officer. However, they said the person was shot alongside someone who was also hit by a bullet but survived.

 

They had been standing close together behind the synagogue door as worshipers “acted bravely to prevent the attacker from gaining entry,” the police said in a statement.

 

On Friday morning, the chief constable of Greater Manchester Police, Stephen Watson, said a pathologist found that one of those killed had suffered “a wound consistent with a gunshot injury.”

 

He said in a statement that the perpetrator of the attack did not have a firearm and that the only shots fired were from the armed police officers responding to the attack.

 

Mr. Watson said: “It follows therefore, that subject to further forensic examination, this injury may sadly have been sustained as a tragic and unforeseen consequence of the urgently required action taken by my officers to bring this vicious attack to an end.”

 

The assailant’s father, Faraj al-Shamie, posted a statement from the family on his Facebook page on Friday condemning the attack and saying it was a “profound shock” to relatives.

 

“The Al-Shamie family in the U.K. and abroad strongly condemns this heinous act, which targeted peaceful, innocent civilians,” the statement said.

 

“We fully distance ourselves from this attack and express our deep shock and sorrow over what has happened. Our hearts and thoughts are with the victims and their families, and we pray for their strength and comfort.”

 

The police have not formally commented on the attacker’s motives, but Prime Minister Keir Starmer of Britain said in an address to the nation on Thursday night that the man had “attacked Jews because they are Jews.”

 

Mr. Starmer, whose wife is Jewish, said that while antisemitism was not new, “it is a hatred that is rising once again, and Britain must defeat it once again.” On Friday, he visited the scene and was photographed meeting police officers.

 

Shabana Mahmood, the Home Secretary, told the BBC on Friday morning that the attacker had arrived in Britain as a child with his family and had been granted British citizenship in 2006.

 

He was not under investigation by the security services and had not been named as a “subject of interest” on their systems, the authorities said, but intelligence officials have not ruled out the possibility that a connection with other people on their radar could emerge.

 

The attacker’s home in Prestwich, a Manchester suburb about two miles from the scene of the attack, was being searched by officers on Friday, along with another house a short walk away from the synagogue.

 

The police on Thursday arrested three people on suspicion of commission, preparation and instigation of acts of terrorism as part of their investigation. They did not name the suspects, who were being held in custody, but said that they were two men in their 30s and a woman in her 60s.

 

Extra patrols were being sent across Manchester to reassure communities, the police said, with a “high visibility presence” around synagogues. On Friday, the government criticized a decision by pro-Palestinian activists to go ahead with a planned demonstration on Saturday in London, despite a police request to postpone the event on the grounds that it would divert their resources.

 

Ms. Mahmood told the BBC that the behavior of the organizers was “unacceptable,” adding that while Britons had the right to protest, “just because you have a freedom doesn’t mean to say you have to use it at every moment.”

 

“Sometimes an act of kindness and stepping back, I think, can do more to hold our country together,” she said.

 

Defend Our Juries, the group that organized the protest, said in a letter to the police that it condemned the attack in Manchester but that it was the force’s “choice” to arrest hundreds of people for holding signs expressing support for Palestine Action. They blamed the government’s decision to ban Palestine Action, a protest group which has targeted Israel-linked defense companies and vandalized two military planes, as a terrorist organization and said it had created an “unnecessary strain on police resources.”

 

In an interview with the BBC on Friday morning, Ephraim Mirvis, Britain’s chief rabbi, described the shock and horror of the Jewish community as it learned about the attack, saying, “Our hearts are shattered.” He added: “What transpired yesterday was an awful blow to us, something which actually we were fearing might happen because of the build up to this action.”

 

He criticized both the recent demonstrations in support of Palestine Action, as well as the regular pro-Palestinian marches, which are organized by a different group, against Israel’s war in Gaza that have taken place in London for almost two years.

 

The Palestinian ambassador to Britain, Husam Zomlot, offered his condolences to the victims and their families in a statement condemning the “heinous attack.”

 

“No one should ever feel unsafe in their home or at their place of worship,” he said. “Violence against civilians must be condemned without hesitation or exception.”

 

•Photo Caption: Prime Minister Keir Starmer of Britain and his wife, Victoria, at the site of the synagogue attack in Manchester, on Friday.Credit…Pool photo by Phil Noble