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Jewish and Arab American leaders across Detroit and the US strongly condemned the 12 March terrorist attack on a Michigan synagogue and largely aimed to lower tensions against the backdrop of the US and Israel’s ongoing military campaign in Iran.
But in Michigan, where large populations of Arab Americans and Jews live near one another, the complexities of the situation can be difficult to grapple with – and few people had easy or quick answers on how to move forward.
In some cases, emotions continue to run high: a pro-Israel state representative on Friday afternoon assailed on social media a Muslim politician who had expressed sadness over the incident.
The Lebanese American suspect, Ayman Ghazali, a 41-year-old shawarma restaurant employee, appears to have carried out the attack in retribution for the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) killing of four of his relatives, including two small children, in an airstrike on their home during its ongoing invasion of Lebanon.
Ghazali reportedly drove his truck through the doors of the Temple Israel synagogue and into a hallway, where he allegedly shot himself fatally after he was confronted by security. Explosives were found inside the truck, which caught fire. Community leaders expressed relief that there was only a minor injury beyond Ghazali’s own death.
Temple Israel is in West Bloomfield Township, a wealthy community a few miles north of Dearborn, the center of the region’s Lebanese American population.
Congregation T’chiyah Rabbi Alana Alpert said that everyone “deserves to walk safely down the streets of our neighborhoods and through the doors of our holy spaces”.
“Anytime someone blames or conflates all Jewish people – including kids at their school – with the state or government of Israel, that is dangerous and antisemitic, and it leads directly to violence against us,” she said. “And that includes when Trump or [Israeli prime minister Benjamin] Netanyahu do it.”
The Jewish Federation of Detroit did not respond to a request for comment, but in a media statement the group said: “We remain steadfast in our commitment to vigilance and security, even as we continue to live proud, vibrant Jewish lives – at our temples and synagogues, in our schools, and throughout our Jewish organizations.”
But some voices have linked the attack on the synagogue to the conflict in the Middle East and Israel’s actions.
Jewish Voice for Peace Detroit’s Lex Eisenberg said they are “broken-hearted in the wake of a horrible attack”.
“It is increasingly clear that the Israeli government’s atrocities make all people, including Jews, less safe,” they added in an email. “The Israeli government carries out wars and genocide against families and children, and then [it] falsely claims these war crimes are done in the name of Jews. This leads to still more anti-semitism.”
Much of the Lebanese American diaspora in south-east Michigan has its roots in southern Lebanon, where the IDF has forcibly displaced more than 800,000 people in southern Lebanon in recent weeks as it seeks to eliminate Hezbollah. Hezbollah operates outside the Lebanese government in the region and carries out attacks on Israel.
Among other support for the Israeli military, the Temple Israel synagogue has hosted IDF soldiers, hosted an IDF recruiter (though he wasn’t recruiting at the synagogue), has held prayers for the IDF and has partnered with the Friends of the IDF, which fundraises to support the military.
Rabbis for Peace founder Alissa Wise said such an attack on Jews stemming from Middle East violence was her “worst fear”.
“On one hand, you want to say it’s a synagogue so it’s an antisemitic attack, but at the same time you understand that Israel deliberately conflates Jewishness with support for Israel’s actions, and you also have a synagogue that supports that project,” Wise said.
Wise added: “How do we hold this complexity in a world like this and in a time like this?”
The response in Dearborn
In Dearborn and adjacent Dearborn Heights, many are shocked that a well-known community member from a popular sandwich shop, Hamido, carried out the attack. The area has been subjected to regular Islamophobic attacks and vitriol from rightwing groups in recent decades. It knows the pain of being targeted; Arab American mayors, imams and other leaders from across the region expressed support for Jewish residents.
“Jewish and Arab communities have always co-existed here in [south-east] Michigan, and the emphatic statements of solidarity I’m seeing from Arab American leaders of all faiths do not surprise me, given greater Detroit’s strong interfaith tradition,” Bilal Baydoun, a former city of Dearborn spokesperson, said.
A Dearborn community leader who declined to use their name said the attacks were “terrible” but added “so are the attacks that are killing our families and friends in Lebanon.
“Where is the sympathy and outrage over that?”
It is that layer that makes the situation so difficult for many, though they and other community leaders stressed that there is little animosity among Arab American and Jewish residents in Michigan; nor are Israel’s actions justification for violence here.
“The unjustified Israeli attack on civilians in Iran and Lebanon gives no blank check to anyone attacking synagogues, civilians and peaceful communities,” Dearborn imam Hassan Qazwini told the Detroit Free Press on Friday.
One notable exception to the calls for civility in the terrorist attack’s wake was pro-Israel Michigan state representative Noah Arbit’s taking rhetorical aim at Abdul El-Sayed, a former Detroit health official who is running for the US Senate. El-Sayed has long been critical of Israel’s attacks in Gaza – which have been roundly condemned internationally – and called for a halt to all foreign military aid, including to Israel.
El-Sayed wrote on X that he was “horrified and heartbroken” in the hours after the Temple Israel attack. Later, in a video, El-Sayed said Ghazali’s actions, Israeli strikes on Lebanon and the Iran war are part of a cycle of violence that must come to an end.
He added that conflating the Temple Israel congregation with the Israeli government amounts to antisemitism.
“One can have righteous anger with the state of Israel while expressing solidarity with the Jewish people, including Jewish people in Israel,” El-Sayed said in the video.
Arbit took to X to excoriate El-Sayed on Friday.
“Amazed by the crocodile tears from someone who’s done more than most to stoke & inflame hatred against Jews,” Arbit wrote. Invoking an acronym for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, he added: “It’s a very small logical leap from ‘AIPAC controls the US government,’ ‘Israel is committing genocide,’ ‘Zionists kill Arab babies’ to ‘kill Jews in West Bloomfield.’”
El-Sayed did not respond to the comment.
However, more broadly, many hope that the tragedy can be an impetus for change. Wise said many pro-Israel, mainstream synagogues have “strong red lines” against speaking with antiwar or pro-Palestinian Jewish groups such as Rabbis for Peace. Wise said she is hopeful the tragedy can bring groups together.
“Sometimes fear and grief and pain can open our hearts,” Wise said. “And I hope that can be the case if it will force people who have been unwilling to sit at the same table to do so.”
