The Israeli military reported on Sunday that the sibling of the individual who carried out an attack on a Michigan synagogue last week, and who was killed in an Israeli airstrike earlier this month, held a position as a Hezbollah commander.
Ibrahim Ghazali, along with three other family members, was killed in Lebanon on March 5 — a week prior to Ayman Mohamad Ghazali driving his vehicle into a prominent synagogue near Detroit and subsequently taking his own life following security forces firing at him.
The Detroit office of the FBI, currently investigating the synagogue incident, opted not to provide a statement regarding the claims made by Israel’s military about Ibrahim Ghazali. FBI spokesperson Jordan Hall mentioned that due to the ongoing investigation, they would refrain from commenting on the specifics of the case.
According to the Israeli military, Ibrahim Ghazali was identified as a Hezbollah commander responsible for overseeing weapons for a unit that launched rockets towards Israel.
A Lebanese official, speaking under the condition of anonymity, confirmed the death of Ibrahim Ghazali. The official disclosed to The Associated Press that Ghazali’s children, Ali and Fatima, as well as his brother, Kassim, were also casualties of the strike that hit their residence just after sunset.
In a statement issued to The Associated Press in Beirut, Hezbollah acknowledged that the brothers, Ibrahim and Kassim, were involved in a local soccer league and were attacked at home alongside their children, without explicitly denying Ibrahim’s association with the group.
Authorities revealed that Ayman Ghazali, aged 41, executed the synagogue assault subsequent to learning about the deaths of four family members in the Israeli airstrike.
Israel has intensified its operations against the Iranian-backed militant group Hezbollah in Lebanon amidst escalating hostilities with Iran across the Middle East.
Ayman Ghazali waited in his vehicle outside Temple Israel near Detroit on Thursday for approximately two hours armed with a rifle, commercial-grade fireworks, and containers of liquid suspected to be gasoline before ramming into the building crowded with numerous children, as per official reports.
After firing shots through his windshield and engaging in a shootout with an armed security guard, Ghazali fatally shot himself when he became stuck in his vehicle and the engine ignited, as stated by Jennifer Runyan, the special agent in charge of the FBI’s Detroit field office. No individuals inside the synagogue, including staff and children, were harmed, likely due to heightened security measures implemented in recent months.
The FBI, leading the probe, characterized the assault on one of the nation’s largest Reform synagogues as a violent act targeting the Jewish community, stopping short of labeling it a terrorist act due to insufficient evidence thus far.
Ayman Ghazali arrived in the U.S. in 2011 on a visa as the spouse of a U.S. citizen and obtained U.S. citizenship in 2016, as confirmed by the Department of Homeland Security. He resided in a one-story brick residence in Dearborn Heights, a Detroit suburb approximately 60 kilometers south of the synagogue.
The attack on the Michigan synagogue coincided with a former Army National Guard member, who had served time in prison for attempting to support the Islamic State, opening fire in a classroom at Old Dominion University in Virginia on the same day, resulting in the death of one person and injuries to two others.