Men linked to London synagogue attacks charged over UK airbase plot

US prosecutors allege that the men accused of directing a wave of attacks on Jewish sites in London earlier this year also orchestrated September’s suspected plot against an airbase in England used by US bombers.The eight-count indictment was announced in Manhattan on Tuesday. It names two men for the first time: Mohsen Mohajeri, 48, an Iranian national prosecutors describe as an operative of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), and Mohammed Ali al-Hassani, 35, an Iraqi citizen.They are charged alongside Mohammad Baqer Saad Dawood al-Saadi, 32, who holds Iraqi and Iranian citizenship. Al-Saadi was charged in May over the attacks in Europe and has been held in New York since then.According to the indictment, Mohajeri and al-Hassani planned attacks on or before 6 April while together in a room in Iraq with a map of London on a computer screen. “We need to get focused on London,” Mohajeri allegedly told al-Hassani. A still from a video of the meeting (pictured above) shows Mohajeri on the right and al-Hassani on the left. A run of six attacks in and around London began about a week later.The attacks were claimed by Harakat Ashab al-Yamin al-Islamiya (HAYI), which prosecutors say was a front for the Iraqi armed group Kataeb Hezbollah. The group claimed about 18 attacks in Europe in the spring.