Police and FBI respond to synagogue hostage situation in Texas

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Authorities are negotiating with a man who has taken people hostage at a synagogue in Colleyville, Texas, during services on Saturday that were being livestreamed.

A suspect was believed to have taken at least four people hostage, including the synagogue’s rabbi, according to reports by the Associated Press and CNN, citing law enforcement sources.

The Colleyville police said they were conducting Swat operations on the block where the Congregation Beth Israel synagogue is located and all residents in the immediate area were being evacuated. The department said it was working with FBI negotiators.

It was not clear how the suspect might have armed himself. Police arrived at about 12.30pm local time. “We ask that you continue to avoid the area,” the Colleyville police department tweeted two hours after they arrived at the scene.

The incident took place during an online livestream of the Shabbat service at the synagogue in Colleyville, in the Dallas-Fort Worth metropolitan area. The livestream cut off at about 2pm local time.

Authorities are still trying to discern a precise motive for the attack. In the livestream the hostage-taker was heard demanding the release of Aafia Siddiqui, a Pakistani neuroscientist suspected of having ties to al-Qaida, who was convicted of trying to kill US military officers while in custody in Afghanistan, one of the law enforcement officials said. Siddiqui is in federal prison in Texas.
The officials said investigators had not positively identified the man and cautioned that the information was based on a preliminary investigation as the situation was still rapidly developing.

Before the livestream was ended, a man could be heard ranting and talking about religion and his sister, the Fort Worth Star-Telegram reported. The man could be heard repeatedly saying he didn’t want to see anyone hurt and that he believed he was going to die, the newspaper said.

Barry Klompus, 63, a member of the congregation since it opened in 1999, said he had been alerted to the situation by another member and quickly turned to the live feed until it was cut off. “It was horrible listening and watching, and it’s that much more horrible not knowing,” Klompus said in a Reuters telephone interview.

A US official briefed on the matter told ABC News the hostage-taker claimed to be the brother of Siddiqui, who is serving an 86-year US prison sentence after her 2010 conviction of shooting at soldiers and FBI agents, and demanding she be freed. That report has not been confirmed.

Katie Chaumont, spokesperson for FBI Dallas, said an FBI SWAT team was at the scene and that crisis negotiators had been communicating with someone inside the synagogue. But she could not say whether the person was armed and she declined to describe what the person had said to authorities, citing operational sensitivity.

Police were first called to the synagogue around 11am local time and people were evacuated from the surrounding neighborhood soon after that, Chaumont said.

There have been no reported injuries, Chaumont said. “It’s an evolving situation, and we have a lot of law enforcement personnel on scene,” Chaumont said.
Law enforcement shut down access to the roads surrounding the synagogue on Saturday afternoon.

The White House press secretary, Jen Psaki, said Joe Biden had been briefed and that members of the national security team were assisting local and federal law enforcement.

The American Jewish Committee said it was “deeply concerned” about the hostage situation at the synagogue. “Our thoughts and prayers are with the local Jewish community at this time,” the organization tweeted. “We will continue to monitor the situation as it develops.”

Congregation Beth Israel began in 1998 as a chavurah, or a small group of Jewish people who gather for prayer services, its website states. This group established a synagogue in Colleyville in 1999 and moved to its current location in 2005.

Colleyville is a city of about 23,000 people, located a short distance from the Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport.

Law enforcement shut down access to the roads surrounding the synagogue on Saturday afternoon.