Police in Belgium said on Friday that they had three people in custody in connection with an explosion that occurred on March 9 outside a synagogue in Liege.
One of the three suspects has been arraigned and the remaining two are awaiting arraignment, the 7sur7 news site reported, citing sources at the federal prosecution service. Police arrested the three suspects on Thursday along with four other individuals who have since been released and are no longer considered suspects, the report said.
The suspects in custody are believed to have acted for payment on behalf of handlers whom the prosecutors did not name.
The Islamist Harakat Ashab al-Yamin al-Islamiya group has claimed responsibility for setting off explosions at the Synagogue de Liège, as well as outside a Jewish school in Amsterdam and synagogues in Rotterdam. In videos released online, unidentified people claimed the group was also behind the torching of a Jewish group’s ambulances in London.
U.S. authorities are preparing to indict an Iran-born man they say was behind Harakat Ashab al-Yamin al-Islamiya and had directed attacks on European Jewish institutions. He also tried to hire a Mexican cartel operative to target American Jews, The Sunday Times reported last week.
Mohammad al-Saadi, 33, is accused by U.S. prosecutors of orchestrating at least 18 attacks across Europe on behalf of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, including firebombings targeting synagogues, including the one in Liege, and other Jewish institutions in the United Kingdom and the Netherlands, according to the newspaper, which quoted U.S. court documents.
He was arrested at a hotel in Istanbul on May 1 and transferred to FBI custody two weeks later, according to the Times. He has been charged with eight terrorism-related offenses and could face life imprisonment if convicted, the newspaper reported.
Al-Saadi allegedly attempted in April to recruit a person he believed was affiliated with a Mexican drug cartel to carry out attacks against Jewish targets in the United States. Prosecutors said the individual was, in fact, an undercover FBI agent, according to the report.
The Times reported that U.S. authorities regard al-Saadi as a senior operative with longstanding ties to Iran-backed militias in Iraq, including Kata’ib Hezbollah (a separate entity from Lebanon’s Hezbollah group), which Washington has designated a terrorist organization.
