Gun-Toting ISIS Fanatics Planned UK’s Worst Massacre on Jewish Street

Two Islamic State extremists have been convicted of orchestrating a planned gun massacre targeting Manchester's Jewish community, in what authorities described as a potential "catastrophic" and "deadliest terrorist attack in UK history."

Walid Saadaoui, 38, and Amar Hussein, 52, were found guilty by a jury at Preston Crown Court on Tuesday of preparing acts of terrorism. Saadaoui's brother, Bilel Saadaoui, 36, was also convicted for failing to disclose information about the plot.

The duo had acquired four AK-47 assault rifles, two handguns, and 1,200 rounds of ammunition, intending a suicide rampage on Jewish sites, with any Christian casualties considered a "bonus," prosecutors said. Their targets included areas around synagogues, schools, and gatherings in Manchester's Jewish quarter, the same neighborhood where a separate stabbing occurred outside a synagogue on October 2, 2025.

Greater Manchester Police Assistant Chief Constable Rob Potts warned that an attack in a crowded Jewish area would have caused "untold harm." "The consequences would have been catastrophic," he stated.

Saadaoui, a former Italian restaurant owner in Great Yarmouth, idolized Abdelhamid Abaaoud, the ringleader of the 2015 Paris attacks that killed 130. Prosecutors said Saadaoui aimed to mimic that carnage in retaliation for Israeli actions in Gaza. After selling his business and home, he used £4,400 from the proceeds as a down payment on the weapons.

Surveillance footage captured Saadaoui scouting Jewish sites with an undercover officer posing as an arms dealer, dubbed "Farouk." He expressed intent to "kill them all, young, old, women, elderly," focusing on schools and events. The pair planned to recruit accomplices, disguise themselves in Jewish clothing, and target responders in an extended spree.

Hussein, an Iraqi ex-soldier who arrived in the UK in 2006 claiming Kuwaiti origin, lived above his workplace in Bolton and had a prior knife conviction. During arrest, he proclaimed, "I'm proud, be terrorist here, I'm proud. We are army from God [sic]."

The plot unraveled through a major undercover operation, codenamed Operation Catogenic, described as the North West's largest counter-terror probe. MI5 flagged Saadaoui's ISIS posts on Facebook in late 2023, leading to surveillance and the sting. Saadaoui was caught red-handed on May 8, 2024, retrieving deactivated weapons from a rented Lexus at a Lancashire hotel.Investigators linked Saadaoui to Hamid al Masalkhi, a Cardiff extremist who joined ISIS in 2013 and later died of cancer. The brothers used bird-keeping as code, calling guns "goldfinches" and ammo "bird seed."

Mark Gardner, CEO of the Community Security Trust, praised the thwarting of these "incredibly dangerous individuals." "It may well have been the worst terrorist act in British history," he said, equating jihadist ideology to Nazism: "They want to kill Jews, end of story."

Saadaoui and Hussein twice reconnoitered Dover's port security, posing as tourists at the White Cliffs. Prosecutor Harpreet Sandhu KC called it "hardly the innocence of a teddy bears' picnic."

Sentencing is pending. Potts hailed the operation for averting disaster, noting Saadaoui's "extreme danger" and Hussein's "fanatical, unrepentant" mindset.