Counter Terrorism Policing (CTP) London is investigating an arson attack at the former East London Central Synagogue on Nelson Street in Whitechapel, the Metropolitan Police said Tuesday.
London Fire Brigade crews responded at 05:16 BST. CCTV footage showed the fire was started deliberately. Minor damage was caused to the front gates and a lock. No injuries were reported and no arrests have been made.
BREAKING: Counter-terror police are investigating an arson incident at a former synagogue in east Londonhttps://t.co/PAiZ4D1jU3
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“The building targeted has not been operational as a synagogue for some years, but that will be of little comfort to the Jewish community in Tower Hamlets, Hackney and beyond, who are first in my thoughts this morning,” Detective Chief Superintendent Brittany Clarke said.
The building was sold prior to its February 12, 2026 auction and is being transferred to the Ashaadini Education and Cultural Centre, a Muslim group planning to convert it into a mosque. “An attack on a house of worship is an attack on all of us,” the Ashaadini Centre said.
Commander Helen Flanagan, head of CTP London, said investigators are examining potential links to prior attacks on Jewish, Israeli, and Iranian dissident sites in the capital. Those incidents began March 23 with the torching of four ambulances belonging to Hatzola, a Jewish emergency charity, in Golders Green and culminated in the April 29 stabbing of two Jewish men, which police declared a terrorism incident.
Most incidents have been attributed on social media to Harakat Ashab al-Yamin al-Islamia (HAYI), a group Western security services assess as likely a front for Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). SOFX has not independently verified those claims.
At a Downing Street summit Tuesday, Prime Minister Keir Starmer said investigating whether “a foreign state has been behind some of these incidents” is an active line of inquiry and warned there would be “consequences” if Iran is found responsible.
