UK-Iranian man charged over arson attack on London memorial wall for victims of Iran regime, Oct. 7

A man who holds both British and Iranian nationality has been charged with an arson attack in April on a memorial wall in a north London area that is home to a large Jewish community, police say.

Ali Reza Fallahi, 45, has been charged with carrying out the attack on the wall in Golders Green. He is due to appear at London’s Westminster Magistrates’ Court tomorrow.

Footage of the wall on social media showed that it bore the images of Iranians killed by their regime during anti-government demonstrations in January, and people killed on October 7, 2023, in the Hamas-led onslaught on southern Israel.

“This charge marks another step forward in one of the investigations into the series of arson attacks targeting the Jewish community and Iranian diaspora in London,” says Helen Flanagan, head of counterterrorism policing in London.

A 38-year-old woman arrested in connection with the arson has been released and faces no further action.

The incident was one of a number of arsons carried out on Jewish sites in Golders Green during a spate of attacks, with police saying they were investigating whether they had links to the Iranian regime.

Two Jewish men were also stabbed in an attack in the neighborhood, prompting the government to raise the national terrorism threat level to “severe” from “substantial.”