{"id":11832,"date":"2026-03-13T17:57:27","date_gmt":"2026-03-13T23:57:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/man-who-rammed-vehicle-into-michigan-synagogue-was-from-lebanon\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T03:32:41","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T03:32:41","slug":"man-who-rammed-vehicle-into-michigan-synagogue-was-from-lebanon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/man-who-rammed-vehicle-into-michigan-synagogue-was-from-lebanon\/","title":{"rendered":"Man who rammed vehicle into Michigan synagogue was from Lebanon"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Law
Law enforcement escort families with children away from the Temple Israel synagogue Thursday in West Bloomfield Township, Michigan. (Paul Sancya\/The Associated Press<\/span>Paul Sancya<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

WEST BLOOMFIELD, Mich. \u2013 The armed man who rammed his vehicle into one of the nation\u2019s largest Reform synagogues on Thursday has been identified as a 41-year-old naturalized U.S. citizen who was born in Lebanon, federal officials said.<\/p>\n

Ayman Mohamad Ghazali was fatally shot by security officers after driving through a hallway at Temple Israel in West Bloomfield Township near Detroit in a vehicle that then caught fire, authorities said.<\/p>\n

Ghazali came to the United States in 2011 on an immediate relative visa as the spouse of a U.S. citizen and was granted U.S. citizenship in 2016, according to the Department of Homeland Security.<\/p>\n

Jennifer Runyan, special agent in charge of the FBI\u2019s Detroit field office, called the crime a \u201ctargeted act of violence against the Jewish community\u201d and said the FBI is leading the investigation, speaking at a news conference Thursday.<\/p>\n

Investigators have not determined a motive.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat drove this person into action has to be determined by the investigation,\u201d said Oakland County Sheriff Mike Bouchard.<\/p>\n

None of the synagogue\u2019s staff, teachers or the 140 children at its early childhood center were injured, Bouchard said.<\/p>\n

In the minutes after the attack, smoke billowed from the synagogue. One security officer was hit by the vehicle and knocked unconscious but did not suffer life-threatening injuries, the sheriff said. Thirty law enforcement officers were treated for smoke inhalation.<\/p>\n

West Bloomfield Police Chief Dale Young said Temple security officers \u201cengaged the individual and neutralized the threat.\u201d<\/p>\n

The suspect was found dead inside his vehicle, Bouchard said.<\/p>\n

Cassi Cohen, director of strategic development at Temple Israel, was standing in the hallway where the crash happened. She said she heard a loud bang, grabbed a few staff members, ran into her office and locked the door.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I heard the crash, I knew it was bad,\u201d Cohen said.<\/p>\n

She said a classroom was near where the car rammed the synagogue and, in addition to the children, who were as old as 4, there were more than 30 staff members in the synagogue.<\/p>\n

\u201cThankfully, we have had many active shooter drills and our staff is prepared for these situations,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Rabbi Arianna Gordon of Temple Israel thanked the security team, law enforcement and early childhood teachers for getting the children out safely and reunited with their parents, calling them the \u201ctrue rock stars of the day.\u201d<\/p>\n

About a dozen parents sprinted to get their children soon after authorities cleared the building. Other families were reunited at a nearby Jewish Community Center.<\/p>\n

Synagogues around the world have been on edge and have been ramping up security since the United States and Israel launched missile strikes against Iran on Feb. 28.<\/p>\n

The FBI has warned that Iranian operatives may be planning drone attacks on targets in California. Two men brought explosives to a far-right protest outside the New York mayoral mansion on Saturday. Investigators allege they were inspired by the Islamic State extremist group.<\/p>\n

An assailant drove a car into people outside an Orthodox synagogue in Manchester, England, on Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish calendar. He stabbed two people to death before officers shot and killed him.<\/p>\n

President Donald Trump said he had been fully briefed on the attack, calling it a \u201cterrible thing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Steven Ingber, CEO of the Jewish Federation of Detroit, lamented the fact that his organization had to train and prepare for an attack.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019d love to say that I\u2019m shocked, that I\u2019m surprised, but I\u2019m not,\u201d he said during a news conference Thursday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

enforcement escort families with children away from the Temple Israel synagogue Thursday in West Bloomfield Township, Michigan. (Paul Sancya\/The Associated PressPaul Sancya WEST BLOOMFIELD, Mich. \u2013 The armed man who rammed his vehicle into one of the nation\u2019s largest Reform synagogues on Thursday has been identified as a 41-year-old naturalized U.S. citizen who was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":11023,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[29],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-11832","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-newsletter"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11832","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11832"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11832\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18553,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11832\/revisions\/18553"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11023"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11832"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11832"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11832"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=11832"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}