The police in the German city of Hagen arrested four people this Thursday, including a 16-year-old Syrian boy, over a suspected Islamist attack on a synagogue on Yom Kippur, the holiest day in Judaism.

Authorities pointed out that they received  “a very serious and concrete tip”  about a potential attack, which led them to search in several buildings until they surrounded the Hagen synagogue late Wednesday, where the typical Yom Kippur overnight vigil was cancelled.

The 16-year-old, a resident in the city, was the first one arrested on Thursday morning and remains in custody, while the three other people were detained during a raid of an apartment, but the police said they have already been released.

“An Islamist-motivated threat”

Some hours after the attack, Armin Laschet, the state Premier of North Rhine-Westphalia, said that “it appears that prior to today on Yom Kippur, an Islamist motivated attack was averted. We will do everything we can to clarify which networks may have been behind”.

North Rhine-Westphalia Interior Minister Herbert Reul also confirmed that the tip had warned about “an Islamist-motivated threat situation”'.

German Justice Minister Christine Lambrecht condemned the attempted attack, stating that “it is intolerable that Jews are again exposed to such a horrible threat and that they cannot celebrate the start of their highest holiday, Yom Kippur, together”.

Anti-Semitic attacks on rise in Germany

Anti-Semitic attacks have increased in Germany in recent years. Hagen police pointed out on Wednesday night that they were in close contact with the Jewish community that “is worried”.

Also on Yom Kippur two years ago, a 27-year-old extremist gunman stormed a synagogue in Halle and killed two bystanders.

He made anti-Semitic and racist views during the trial and was given a life sentence last year.