UK blames Iran-backed proxy for arson attacks on Jewish sites

Security Minister Dan Jarvis told Parliament that an arson attack at a synagogue in Finchley on 15 April, a suspected arson attack at premises linked to a Jewish charity in Hendon on 17 April and a suspected arson attack at a synagogue in Harrow on 18 April were linked to a proxy backed by Iran.

Counter Terrorism Policing was already investigating the attacks when Jarvis set out the case in Parliament. Jarvis also said police were looking at an attempted arson attack the previous week on a Persian-language media organisation that had already faced serious threats linked to the Iranian regime and its proxies. By the time of his statement, police had made 15 arrests connected to the April incidents.

The London attacks came after an earlier arson attack on volunteer-led ambulances run by the Jewish community in Golders Green on 23 March, which led to eight arrests and four charges. Authorities reinforced the area with visible policing, and the Metropolitan Police used additional stop-and-search powers in north-west London.

On 28 February, Prime Minister Keir Starmer said the Iranian regime posed a direct threat to dissidents and the Jewish community in the United Kingdom, and that over the previous year it had backed more than 20 potentially lethal attacks on UK soil. In March 2025, the Security Minister said MI5’s state-threat investigations had jumped 48% over the previous year and that the UK had responded to 20 Iran-backed plots since the start of 2022, often involving criminal proxies intended to conceal Tehran’s role.

On 11 May, Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper announced sanctions against organisations and individuals enabling hostile Iranian activity, including criminal proxies acting for the Iranian state, and said the package aligned with European Union action. She also said the government would fast-track Home Office state-threats legislation. The following month, Britain joined 23 other countries in condemning the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, the Quds Force and the Ministry of Intelligence and Security, saying they had carried out lethal plotting and other malign activity across Europe, North America and Australia, including against Jewish and Israeli communities.

Officials have also paired those moves with money: an extra £5 million for Project Servator and £73.4 million in annual protective security funding for Jewish, Muslim and other faith sites.