Iran was behind at least two terrorist attacks targeting the Jewish community in Belgium, the country’s security services disclosed. Pro-Iranian terror cells were involved in a blast outside a historic synagogue in the city of Liege in March and a subsequent arson attack in Antwerp’s Jewish quarter, Belgium’s intelligence agency Coordination Unit for Threat Analysis (CUTA) found.
“Belgium has confirmed that Iran was behind the attacks in the country six months ago,” Israel’s Ynetnews reported Saturday.
Tehran is suspected of directing a series of attacks targeting Jewish sites across several European cities since the beginning of 2026, including Liège, Antwerp, Rotterdam, Amsterdam, and London. “An Iran-affiliated jihadist group called the Islamic Movement of the Companions of the Right, also known as IMCR or Harakat Ashab al-Yamin al-Islamia, previously claimed responsibility for similar attacks, including an arson attack on a synagogue in Rotterdam and an attack against a Jewish school in Amsterdam,” the news website added.
The attacks in Belgium are part of Iran’s global campaign to target Jews and Israelis across the world. Gert Vercauteren, head of CUTA, said recently that local terror cells “certainly followed Iran’s call to strike Jewish and Israeli interests everywhere in the world.”
The involvement of Iran-linked terror cells does not come as a surprise. Shortly after the Liege Synagogue bombing, Vercauteren told the French newspaper Le Monde that it “is conceivable that pro-Iranian cells aimed to demonstrate their capacity to act.”
The Brussels Times reported Friday:
Speaking to Francophone broadcaster RTBF, the security chief [Vercauteren] stated that perpetrators “certainly” acted on Tehran’s orders to strike Jewish locations worldwide.
In March, explosives were detonated outside a Liège synagogue. In that same week, arsonists completely torched a car in the middle of Antwerp’s Jewish quarter. There were no casualties in either attack.
Now, however, Vercauteren stressed that the attacks formed part of a coordinated campaign rather than isolated vandalism.
Belgian authorities faced an immediate escalation in security threats following Hamas’ attack in Israel on 7 October 2023 and the outbreak of the war in Gaza. Tensions then boiled over in early spring.
An explosive device was detonated on Liège’s Rue Léon Frédéricq shortly before 04:00 on 9 March. This sudden blast shattered the quiet of the provincial city. (…)
Cross-border links complicate the ongoing investigation: Belgian incidents coincided with a string of plots in the Netherlands. Intelligence agencies disrupted several simultaneous operations. One such aborted plot involved a planned bombing of a synagogue in the Dutch town of Heemstede.
The trend is not limited to Europe. In 2025, Australia’s intelligence agency held Iran responsible for at least two antisemitic attacks in the country.
Even before the October 7 attack, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) has been targeting Israelis and Jews across the world. From Africa to South America, Iranian-backed terrorists have been behind several deadly and foiled attacks on cultural, diplomatic, and tourist sites. A 1992 car bombing at the Israeli Embassy by the Iranian-backed Hezbollah terrorist group killed 29 people and injured 240 others.
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