The Heaton Park Hebrew Congregation Synagogue in Manchester was the scene of a brutal attack by Jihad Al-Shamie on Thursday, October 2, lasting a mere eight minutes. The frenzied assault resulted in the deaths of two worshippers, Adrian Daulby and Melvin Cravitz, and left four others seriously injured. Police, who shot Al-Shamie dead, swiftly arrested six suspects after raiding two homes, with four individuals remaining under interview. Detectives are now faced with the task of understanding the radicalization of the 35-year-old Syrian immigrant, who was granted British citizenship at 16, and how he transformed into a bloodthirsty extremist capable of dressing as a suicide bomber with a fake explosive belt to attack innocent worshippers celebrating Yom Kippur, the holiest day in the Jewish calendar. The investigation also seeks to determine what prevented his extremist tendencies from being detected earlier, highlighting the incident as a tragedy that was waiting to happen.

Jihad Al-Shamie was the eldest son of Faraj and Formosa Al-Shamie, who left their native Syria in the early 1990s to move to the UK. His father, Faraj, a 64-year-old surgeon, secured a position at North Manchester General Hospital, and the family, including Jihad’s younger brothers Jawad and Kenan, settled in Delaunays Road. Home videos from Faraj’s YouTube account depict a seemingly normal 1990s childhood, featuring trips to Chester Zoo and the Camelot theme park, and footage of Al-Shamie cuddling a cat or pushing his brother on a swing. Neighbours recalled the family was not particularly religious, and camcorder footage even showed the boys participating in nativity plays at their local primary school. Later, at Crumpsall High School, Al-Shamie’s academic performance was unexceptional. Around the age of 15, he sustained a head injury from a serious fall during a foreign holiday but returned to school after treatment. A former teacher described him as 'strange' and 'weird,' with occasional disciplinary issues, yet he reportedly displayed no overt signs of extremism at that time.

As a teenager, Al-Shamie developed two significant hobbies: playing violent video games and smoking 'skunk' marijuana. His obsession with gaming reportedly began in primary school, with neighbours noting he would play for so long his eyes would 'twitch.' In his teens, friends claimed he spent hours daily in his bedroom, smoking skunk and honing his skills on games like Street Fighter. YouTube footage from August 2010 even shows him competing at a European Console League event in Liverpool. The following year, he enrolled at Liverpool John Moores University to study English, media, and cultural studies, but quit after just one year. Friends from this period stated he barely attended lectures, instead spending most of his waking hours in pyjamas, 'smoking weed, working out and playing video games.' He subsequently moved back in with his parents.

Around the time Al-Shamie dropped out of university, his parents’ marriage ended. His father, Faraj, left his hospital job for a career with the Red Cross and other non-governmental organizations in international crisis zones, such as Afghanistan, South Sudan, and Mali. Faraj, who is now believed to reside in France, expressed 'shock and sorrow' following the synagogue attack, seeking to 'fully distance' himself from his son’s extremist behaviour. However, his own social media history reveals years of highly questionable material concerning Israel. In 2012, he described Israel as an 'arch-enemy' and 'the head of the snake.' By 2015, he openly supported Hamas, a proscribed terror organization, praising its fighters. After the October 7 attacks, Faraj lauded the terrorists as 'God’s men on earth,' asserting that their actions 'proved beyond doubt that Israel will not remain.' Jihad’s brother Kenan, a maths graduate working for IBM, also posted provocative content on Facebook during the Gaza crisis, expressing prayers for 'Al-Sham country [an area including Israel and Palestine] from the evil of aggressors.'

Unlike his high-achieving brothers—Jawad, a pharmacist with an MA, and Kenan, an IBM employee—Jihad Al-Shamie never held down a steady job after leaving university. He spent nearly a decade living with his mother Formosa in Prestwich, Greater Manchester, with no clear means of financial support. While he briefly appeared on the register of a Manchester-based tutoring agency and is thought to have taken sporadic work as a computer programmer, his time prior to 2020 was largely devoted to video games, cannabis consumption, and working out in the garden. However, during the pandemic lockdown, neighbours noticed a significant lifestyle change. He began wearing robes, despite the family not being overtly practising Muslims, and started avoiding eye contact. One resident even complained to the police that Al-Shamie was attempting to preach Islam and the Koran to her two Afghan foster children in the street, although it is unclear if he was explicitly named in the complaint. Police, however, insisted he was 'not known to counter-terrorism' prior to the attack.

Al-Shamie’s personal life was marked by deception and bigamy. During the lockdown era, he met Ikra Sulehman from South Manchester and married her in an Islamic ceremony in early 2022. They had three children—Nul, Essa, and Adam—within three years, with Al-Shamie listing his occupation as 'full-time father' on birth certificates. Despite this, he struggled financially, becoming subject to a debt-relief order in September and returning to unemployment by Easter, after a brief period as a call-handler with the RAC. Concurrently, he entered into a bigamous Islamic marriage with Elizabeth Davis, a 35-year-old Muslim convert and NHS worker with five children from previous relationships, whom he met last autumn. This second marriage, however, also appeared to be short-lived, as at the time of the synagogue attack, Davis was co-habiting with another man, and Jihad had separated from both spouses, returning to live with his mother.

Beyond his marriages, Al-Shamie was an obsessive user of Muslim dating apps, employing fake names like 'Valentino' and 'Ahmed' to contact eligible women. A friend noted seeing multiple dating app notifications on his phone despite knowing he was married. One ex-girlfriend, whom he met on the Muzmatch app at age 18, described being 'groomed into a controlling relationship' for four months. He lied about his age, claiming to be 24 while in his thirties, and arranged secret meetings at a Premier Inn. The woman revealed he cheated on her extensively, even sending her videos of himself with other, younger girls. After their relationship ended, his behaviour escalated to harassment, including turning up at her home and workplace. On one occasion, he locked her in his car, threatening to kill her with his bare hands and pulling her hair, only releasing her after a friend threatened to call the police. The ex-girlfriend, now living overseas, also reported receiving abusive messages and 'rape fantasies' from him, including one celebrating 'destroying' her.

These patterns of growing misogyny coincided with Al-Shamie’s slide into extremism. He began pressuring women in his life to wear traditional dress and privately suggested he was interested in joining the terror organization Isis. Friends confirmed his radicalization; Qas noted Al-Shamie started using the encrypted messaging app Telegram to search for Isis videos and even tried to show one at a shisha lounge. Another friend, Asim, observed a change in Al-Shamie a year prior, finding his thoughts 'a bit too radical.' Police have also revealed that Al-Shamie was on bail accused of raping a different woman when he carried out the synagogue attack. He reportedly had a criminal record for other, less serious offenses, some involving his treatment of women. However, police maintained he was not on the radar of counter-terror police or security services until the day of the attack. Furthermore, police are investigating whether Al-Shamie was responsible for sending a death threat in 2012 to Tory politician John Howell, a supporter of Israel, with an email signed 'Jihad Alshamie' stating, 'It is people like you who deserve to die.'

A voicemail message sent by Al-Shamie to one of his wives, exclusively revealed after the atrocity, offers further insight into his manipulative nature. In the message, sent after he had admitted to her that he was already married, he expresses how much he misses her children, saying, 'Allah will forgive you for your shortcomings.' He admits to being 'angry' and saying 'some stuff,' but also calls her 'babe' and professes his feelings for her and the children. He makes false promises to move very close to her, support her, and 'make it work this time, properly,' lying about not being in Manchester. This manipulative communication, begging for forgiveness while acknowledging past anger and upset, highlights his deceptive efforts to regain trust and control through emotional appeals and false assurances, even as his lies continued to unravel.