(Belgrade) Two men were detained after the crossbow attack that injured a police officer on duty in front of the Israeli embassy in Belgrade on Saturday, described as “terrorist” by the Serbian authorities, the Minister of Defense said on Sunday. ‘Interior.
The assailant, who seriously injured the police officer before being shot dead by the latter, was identified by the police as being a “convert” to Islam born in 1999 in Mladenovac, a town about fifty kilometers to the south from Belgrade.
According to the government, this “terrorist act directed against the Serbian state” is “linked to several people long suspected of having connections with the Wahhabi movement”, an ultraconservative branch of Islam which dominates in Saudi Arabia.
After several “preventative” arrests and a raising of the alert level in the Serbian capital, two men were placed in detention, Interior Minister Ivica Dacic said on Sunday on public channel RTS.
One of them, a convert to Islam, was arrested on Saturday in Belgrade while the other was arrested in Novi Pazar, a historical and political centre of the Bosnian Muslim minority in Serbia where the attacker also resided.
“The research was carried out in various places in Serbia, dozens of people were questioned,” he said, specifying that they all belong “to the Wahhabi extremist movement”.
Police operations continue, he added.
Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz thanked Serbian authorities for their “strong support and cooperation” on X. “Terrorism cannot be tolerated!” he wrote on Saturday.
The Israeli ambassador to Serbia, Yahel Vilan, expressed his gratitude to the policeman “who courageously prevented the attack” on the diplomatic representation. He visited her on Sunday in a hospital in Belgrade.
The police officer, 34, was hit in the neck by crossbow fire and underwent surgery on Saturday.