A Jewish man who converted to Islam after being rejected by the IDF has now been arrested in connection with an alleged terror plot.
The unnamed man from the East Jerusalem neighbourhood of Kafr ‘Aqab was born to a Muslim-Arab father and a Jewish-Israeli mother. He is reported to have tried to join the IDF in the wake of the October 7 massacre, only to be barred from joining for undisclosed reasons.
It was after this rejection that he is said to have converted to Islam.
Now, the Israel Police has taken him, his father and another suspect into custody to be questioned over an alleged terror plot, which one of the investigators told Ynet is "one of the most serious" cases they had ever dealt with.
Officers have claimed that the suspects' alleged plans involved staging a bombing at a checkpoint in Northern Jerusalem, assassinating someone they believed to be an Israeli Air Force pilot and carrying out a mass shooting in a nightclub in central Israel.
The investigator said that catching the three suspects has prevented a mass casualty attack.
According to the Jerusalem Post, the three suspects were caught after the police carried out a sting operation. The father allegedly attempted to purchase explosives from a contact he believed to be a black market dealer, but who was actually an undercover officer.
On arrest, search teams reportedly seized bomb-making equipment, ammunition and ready-to-use pipe bombs at two of the suspects’ addresses. The third suspect is reported to have been helping to prepare the explosives and hiding them in his own home. All three are currently in custody awaiting charges.
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