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The FBI confirmed this Monday that the attack against Temple Israel of West Bloomfield Township, on the outskirts of Detroit, was an act of terrorism inspired by Hezbollah's ideology. The agency revealed that Ayman Ghazali, 41, a U.S. citizen of Lebanese origin, recorded a video before the assault in which he expressed his intention to cause as much damage as possible. Jennifer Runyan, director of the FBI's Detroit office, presented the findings at a press conference.
Ghazali arrived at the synagogue parking lot on March 12th and waited for about two hours before acting. Shortly after noon, he rammed his Ford F-150 pickup truck into the closed doors of the building and advanced through the hallway of the children's education area, where there were about 150 children and staff. A guard was run over by the vehicle. Ghazali exchanged shots with another officer before taking his own life. The truck, loaded with commercial-grade fireworks and gasoline canisters, caught fire during the confrontation. No children or employees were injured.
Days earlier, Ghazali had suffered a devastating loss. On March 5, an Israeli bombing in Mashghara, his hometown in southern Lebanon, killed his two brothers, Kassim and Ibrahim, along with two of the latter's children. Ibrahim's wife was seriously injured. The attacker's ex-wife called the Dearborn Heights police shortly before the assault to warn that she noticed him disturbed and with suicidal tendencies.Ayman Mohamad Ghazali sent a photo with a weapon and Koranic messages to a relative in Lebanon before the attack on the Temple Israel synagogue in Michigan (CBS News)}
We recommend reading: The investigation revealed links between Ghazali's environment and Hezbollah. Israel identified Ibrahim as a commander of the group's Badr unit, responsible for coordinating rocket launches against Israeli territory. National Intelligence Director Tulsi Gabbard testified before the Senate that the attacker had family ties to "a Hezbollah leader." The FBI found videos and images in his accounts with rhetoric of revenge and ideological support for the organization. In the previous days, Ghazali searched the internet for synagogues and Jewish cultural centers in Michigan until choosing Temple Israel, even consulting the midday schedules. Ghazali arrived in the United States in 2011 with an immigrant visa and obtained citizenship in 2016. He resided in Dearborn Heights, a suburb of Detroit with one of the largest Lebanese Shia communities in the country, and worked at a local Mediterranean restaurant. According to sources cited by CBS News, after learning of the death of his brothers, he stopped showing up for work and isolated himself. His children lived with his ex-wife after a divorce filed in 2024. Civil defense members from the Islamic Health Authority work at a damaged site after an Israeli attack in Mashghara, in the western part of the Bekaa Valley, Lebanon, November 10, 2024. REUTERS/Maher Abou Taleb Temple Israel, founded in 1941 in Detroit and moved to West Bloomfield in 1980, is one of the largest Reform Judaism congregations in the United States, with 3,500 families and 12,000 members. The attack caused serious damage in the area of child education. Federal prosecutor Jerome Gorgon compared the method to the 1983 Hezbollah bombing of the Beirut Marine barracks, one of the deadliest against US military personnel. The attack is part of a sustained escalation of antisemitism. The Anti-Defamation League recorded twelve attacks or plots motivated by hatred of Jews in the United States between July 2024 and January 2026, compared to seven in the previous four and a half years. The Secure Communities Network organization reported more than 8,000 calls for violence against the Jewish community in the six days following the attack, the highest level ever recorded in that period.
