Manchester, England — For Chaim Leob, the blaring sirens on Thursday morning were out of the ordinary. Usually, the sounds of emergency vehicles passing by are not particularly alarming—but this day was different. Sirens came and did not stop. Police, ambulances, fire trucks, and a circling helicopter flooded the neighborhood.
It was Yom Kippur, the holiest day in the Jewish calendar. As an observant Orthodox Jew, Leob would not normally switch on his phone or check news updates. At that moment, he and many members of his community in Crumpsall and nearby areas were unaware that a violent attack was unfolding.
Emergency services were converging on the Heaton Park Hebrew Congregation Synagogue, where an assailant had driven a car into pedestrians and then stabbed several people. Two people were killed in the incident.
Armed police were deployed quickly around the synagogue, and authorities urged the public to stay indoors and avoid the area. But those messages did not reach many worshippers deeply engaged in the solemn observances of the day.
Rivka H., a legal secretary and mother of four who attends the Heaton Park synagogue and lives minutes away, recounted hearing the sirens all morning. She was anxious but, like others, could not use her phone due to the religious observance.
“There was so much police around the synagogue, so many sirens, it made me feel sick,” she said.
“Then I knocked on my neighbor’s door; she told me two people had died. I was really, really shocked.”
The attack has left the local Jewish community in shock and mourning—especially poignant given its occurrence on such a sacred day.
