Fourth suspect arrested in London court over arson attack on Jewish ambulances |
Three young men were charged with arson and a fourth person was arrested for burning four ambulances run by the Jewish medical charity Hatzolah in north London, British authorities have said.
British citizens Hamza Iqbal, 20, and Rehan Khan, 19, appeared Saturday at a Westminster court alongside an unnamed 17-year-old UK-Pakistani dual-national over the March 23 attack.
All three were remanded in custody, with the 17‑year‑old ordered to be held in youth detention accommodation. The three defendants are set to to appear at London’s Central Criminal Court, better known as the Old Bailey, on April 24.
The three were arrested at separate addresses in east London on Wednesday. They were charged with arson, “being reckless as to whether life would be endangered,” the capital’s Metropolitan Police said in a statement.
The suspects did not enter pleas at the 45-minute hearing at Westminster Magistrates Court on Saturday. The court also heard that a fourth suspect was arrested in connection with the fire.
“There is significant evidence that this was a premeditated and targeted attack against the Jewish community,” prosecutor Emma Harraway told the court.
Two men in their 40s were released on bail on March 25 over the attack in Golders Green, which is home to a significant Jewish population. Nobody was physically hurt in the attack.
Since the Golders Green fire, the police have promised beefed-up security around Jewish community sites across London.
Counterterror police are investigating the attack as an antisemitic hate crime and looking into a claim of responsibility by a group with potential links to Iran, but have not declared it an act of terrorism.
The Harakat Ashab al-Yamin al-Islamiya group, or Islamic Movement of the Companions of the Right, has also claimed responsibility for attacks on Jewish communities in Belgium and the Netherlands. French counterterror officials have likewise suggested the group may have been involved in a foiled bomb plot targeting a Bank of America branch in Paris on March 28.
Jewish communities in North America and Europe have been targeted over a dozen times since the US and Israel launched a bombing campaign on Iran on February 28 in a bid to destabilize its regime and destroy its nuclear and ballistic missile programs.
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