One of the allegations made in the criminal complaint against Kata’ib Hezbollah senior official Mohammad Baqer Saad Dawood Al-Saadi, following the US Department of Justice announcement of his arrest on Friday, was that Iranian proxies may have been behind at least two March shooting attacks in Toronto.
In the complaint, Al-Saadi, working on behalf of the Islamic Regime proxy, told an undercover law enforcement officer that his "people" were behind two attacks in Canada, against a consulate and synagogue.
The officer believed the consulate attack to be the March 10 shooting at the US consulate in Toronto. No injuries were caused by the early morning shooting, the Toronto Police Service said at the time, but damage was caused to the building.
March saw three different shooting attacks on Toronto area synagogues. On March 2, after Purim celebrations ended, there was a shooting at the Temple Emanu-El synagogue, leaving multiple bullet holes in the synagogue’s front windows.
On March 6, shots were fired at the Beth Avraham Yoseph of Toronto (the BAYT), and on March 7 at the Shaarei Shomayim synagogue.
An 18-year-old man was charged with the latter two incidents on May 6, according to the Toronto Police Service and York Regional Police.
TPS did not immediately provide a comment on if Iranian involvement had been a line of inquiry prior to Friday.
Al-Saadi plotted to attack three US Jewish sites
Al-Saadi was allegedly behind 20 different attacks and plots in North America and Europe, many of them under the banner of Harakat Ashab al-Yamin al-Islamia (HAYI). He was arrested, extradited, and charged on Friday for attacks on US interests in Europe and a plot to attack three Jewish sites in the US.
Kata’ib Hezbollah is widely regarded as a proxy of the Iranian regime and the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps.