The man suspected of stabbing two Jewish people in Golders Green has been named as Essa Suleiman.
Suleiman, 45, a Somali-born British national, was arrested on Wednesday after Shloime Rand, 34, and Moshe Ben Baila, named locally as Moshe Shine, 76, were attacked by a knifeman.
Police have confirmed the suspect is a 45-year-old Somali-born British national with a history of ‘serious violence and mental health issues’, who first came to the UK legally in the 1990s.
He was referred to the government’s anti-extremism programme Prevent in 2020, but the case was closed later that year. It is understood Suleiman, previously of Camberwell, is a Somali translator who once worked as a school security guard.
In 2008, Suleiman was accused of attacking a police officer and his dog, leaving the officer with injuries that kept him off work for five months.
PC Neil Sampson was responding to reports of a knife attack in Swindon, Wiltshire, with his German Shepherd Anya. It was reported they chased the suspect as he fled, but the man stabbed the officer and dog repeatedly, while also injuring a second officer.
Earlier today the PM was heckled by members of the local community who accused him of failing to tackle anti-Semitism when he visited the scene of the attack and met some of the heroic by-standers who jumped into action to help the victims.
Meanwhile leader of the Greens Zack Polanski was condemned for sharing a tweet suggesting officers responding had been too heavy-handed.
As Sir Keir was booed in Golders Green:
Essa Suleiman, 45, is a Somali-born British national who was previously accused of attacking a police officer in 2008
The Somali-born British national with a long history of violence and mental health problems, police have said
While one of the police officers managed to throw the knife away, another officer as well as the bystander gained control of the man’s arm
A convoy of cars carrying Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer drives past protesters in Golders Green today. He was booed amid chants of ‘traitor’
Zack Polanski has retweeted a post suggesting hero policemen who disarmed the Golders Green terrorist were heavy handed
CCTV image reportedly shows the moment Moshe Shine was stabbed while waiting for a bus
Police across the UK have stepped up patrols in response to yesterday’s attack that saw the two Jewish men taken to hospital.
Armed officers were called to the scene after initial reports the suspect had attacked in broad daylight at around 11:15am on Wednesday. Local community volunteers from security organisations Shomrim were first on the scene, accompanied by paramedics from the Jewish charity Hatzola.
Heroic officers confronted the suspect – who attempted to stab them – despite fearing he could have explosives in a large backpack he was carrying.
Video footage showed him being Tasered by Met officers before being kicked in the head, as they repeatedly yelled at him to ‘drop the knife’.
It came after police were called to a separate incident believed to involve the same suspect in Southwark, south London at 8:50am yesterday.
Officers were called to reports of a man armed with a knife involved in an altercation outside a property on Great Dover Street. One occupant of the address sustained minor injuries, and police launched a search for a man in the surrounding area.
But less than two hours later, on the opposite side of the city, the suspect is alleged to have stabbed the two men, whose injuries are fortunately not life-threatening.
Iranian-linked terror group Harakat Ashab al-Yamin al-Islamiyya (HAYI) claimed responsibility for the attack yesterday, but intelligence sources suggested this was ‘opportunistic’. The group provided no evidence it was behind the stabbings.
The attack is the latest in a series of incidents involving Jewish sites over recent weeks and have prompted calls for urgent action, with accusations the Government has not done enough to tackle anti-Semitism.
Chief Rabbi Sir Ephraim Mirvis called for ‘meaningful action’ to tackle the ‘root causes’ of anti-Semitism, while the Board of Deputies of British Jews said anti-Semitism must be ‘confronted, punished and deterred with the full force of the state’.
The Commissioner of the Met Police Sir Mark Rowley yesterday confirmed the incident is being treated as a terror attack and warned against malign states and actors.
He said: ‘This was an attack on Londoners and it was an attack on British Jews.
The Prime Minister visited Golders Green today, avoiding the crowds and meeting members of Shomrim, the Jewish community security organisation
Bodycam footage of the horrifying incident in Golders Green shows the alleged terrorist walk towards officers while refusing to drop the knife
‘Too many Jewish people in this country feel they have to make choices that no Briton should ever have to make, about how they dress, where they go, or how visibly they live their lives. That is completely unacceptable and has gone on for far too long.
‘We also need to be honest about the nature of the threat. Antisemitism is fuelled by hateful and extremist ideologies. It comes from hostile states, the extreme right, and the extreme left.
‘These are terrorist and hateful belief systems but they are all rooted in racism. They are given space to operate when civic debate is weak, when hatred is excused, and when people are unwilling to challenge it directly.’
Speaking from his hospital bed one of the victims, Shloime Rand, 34, said he held the Government responsible and that it is a ‘miracle’ he survived being stabbed in the chest.
Mr Rand alleged that Sir Keir Starmer’s administration is ‘not doing its job’ to protect Jewish people in the UK, who he says are ‘afraid’ and ‘uncomfortable walking in the street’.
Asked whether he felt let down by the Government, he said ‘definitely’. He added: ‘The Government, they are the ones that are able to take care of the problems. And they are not doing their job.
‘People are really concerned, people are afraid, people are uncomfortable walking in the street, people are blaming obviously the Government for not doing anything about what’s going on.’
Today protesters in Golders Green showed their anger at Sir Keir as he finally visited the scene of the attack, 24 hours after it occurred, calling him a ‘coward’ for not facing them sooner.
At lunchtime, the Labour leader’s police convoy took him away from the crowds heckling him. He was instead whisked into a closed doors meeting at the new headquarters of the local Jewish ambulance service Hatzollah.
Sir Keir held a roundtable with first responders and leaders from Hatzola as well as Shomrim, a volunteer Jewish security group.
He was joined by Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood and Sarah Sackman, MP for Finchley and Golders Green, as well Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley.
But the Prime Minister was heckled and booed as he arrived by a group of protesters holding signs reading ‘Keir Starmer Jew harmer’.
One protester, Mendy Muster, 23, an accountant and Golders Green local told the Daily Mail: ‘We all think he is a coward for not answering us directly. He does want to be held accountable.
‘He knows he has let us down. He knows it is his fault and he taking too long. He should have been yesterday let alone today. He is not doing enough he is not preventing anything he is reacting’.
Both victims remain in hospital in a stable condition, with a police probe into the terror-related incident ongoing
Police officers at the scene of the attack in Golders Green on Wednesday
This afternoon Sir Keir gave a statement in Downing Street on the attack and declined to apologise to British Jews.
He was asked whether he should say sorry after one of the victims of the double stabbing in Golders Green said he felt let down by the Government.
The Prime Minister replied: ‘Can I start by saying I absolutely understand the high levels of anxiety and concern that there are, reflected in the various reactions over the last days. I completely understand. That anxiety has been there for a very long time, and the appalling terrorist attack yesterday made it worse.’ But he did not say he was sorry.
In his statement, Sir Keir hit out at the ‘malign’ threat posed by hostile states including Iran, and thanked first responders for preventing ‘a much greater tragedy’.
He said: ‘I want to thank the Jewish security services… who prevented a much greater tragedy yesterday. I met some of the first responders today, and on behalf of the country, I thank them for their bravery. We will strengthen the visible police presence in our Jewish communities.
‘We will increase our investment in those Jewish security services. We will introduce much stronger powers to shut down charities that promote antisemitic extremism.
‘We will prevent hate preachers from entering our country, bar them from our campuses, our streets, our communities. Work with our justice system to speed up sentencing on antisemitic attacks so there is a stronger deterrence factor.
‘And we need stronger powers to tackle the malign threat posed by states like Iran, because we know for a fact that they want to harm British Jews, which is why we will fast track the necessary legislation’.
He said the Jewish community is ‘scared’ and in ‘terror’ of going about their daily lives as Jews, including taking their children to school and using the NHS, adding: ‘Yesterday, this anxiety that is always there went to another place, to terror, frankly. That is the right word.’
The Prime Minister also hit out at those attending pro-Palestine marches who fail to call out anti-Semitism.
‘Take the marches that happen regularly across Britain. Of course, we protect freedom of speech and peaceful protest in this country, but if you are marching with people wearing pictures of paragliders without calling it out, you are venerating the murder of Jews.
‘If you stand alongside people who say, “globalise the Intifada”, you are calling for terrorism against Jews, and people who use that phrase should be prosecuted. It is racism, extreme racism, and it has left a minority community in this country scared, intimidated, wondering if they belong.
‘So I say again, this Government will do everything in our power to stamp this hatred out, we will strengthen our security and protect our Jewish community. But I also call on everyone decent in this country to open their eyes to Jewish pain, Jewish suffering and Jewish fear.’
It came after Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood said today she was treating the protection of Jewish communities as an ’emergency’.
The Government has unveiled £25million of funding to boost police patrols and protections around synagogues, schools and community centres.
Legislation creating powers to target people and organisations acting on behalf of state-sponsored groups will also be ‘fast-tracked’ in the coming weeks.
However, community leaders and the Tories insisted the investment was ‘not sufficient’, and there had to be action against ‘Islamist extremism and jihadism’.
There are fresh demands for a ban pro-Palestine marches, with critics adamant they contribute to ‘a tone of anti-Semitism’.
Today leader of the Green Party Zack Polanski was also condemned for sharing a tweet which appeared to suggest the hero policemen who disarmed the terror suspect had been too heavy-handed.
He reposted an online critic who said: ‘So essentially his [Sir Mark Rowley’s] officers were repeatedly and violently kicking a mentally ill man in the head when he was already incapacitated by Taser’.
It has led to accusations that Mr Polanski, who has previously said he would like to be the next prime minister, was ‘more concerned’ about the suspected terrorist’s wellbeing than those he is accused of stabbing in the street.
Labour’s Jonathan Hinder tweeted: ‘This is so telling. Polanski hates the brave police officers who stopped this. He’s more concerned about the antisemitic terrorist with a knife in his hand! Isn’t that right Zack Polanski?’
Home Office minister Mike Tapp said he was ‘disgusted’ and claimed that the ‘Green Party has hit a new low’.
The Daily Mail asked Mr Polanski to comment.
Elsewhere, it is being reported that the UK’s terror threat level could go up in the wake of the stabbings, which come just six months after another terror attack against the Jewish community in Manchester.
Officials are expected to announce later today that the threat to the UK from all forms of terrorism will move from ‘substantial’ to ‘severe’, meaning an attack is now highly likely.
The threat level was last assessed as severe in November 2021 following the Liverpool Women’s Hospital bombing when a failed asylum seeker detonated an improvised explosive device killing himself and injuring a taxi driver.
In February 2022 independent JTAC experts decided to lower the terror threat to ‘substantial’, meaning an attack is likely.
It is understood the change in threat level will be formerly announced by the Home Secretary later.