A series of attacks on Jewish institutions across Europe has intensified since the outbreak of the Iran-Israel war, with incidents spanning Belgium, the Netherlands, Britain, France, North Macedonia and Germany — and a previously unknown pro-Iranian group claiming responsibility for many of them. The latest target was the Eclipse Grillbar, a Jewish restaurant in Munich, where unidentified perpetrators attached explosive devices to the windows during the night and detonated them before fleeing. No one was injured, but damage is estimated at several thousand euros. A video circulating on social media the following day, attributed to a group calling itself Harakat Ashab al-Yamin al-Islamia (HAYI), warned that the attack could have killed people had it taken place during the day.

The pattern of attacks stretches back to early March, beginning with an explosion outside a synagogue in Liège, Belgium, and continuing with an arson attack on a synagogue in Rotterdam, an explosion outside a Jewish school in Amsterdam, the torching of four ambulances belonging to a Jewish emergency service in the Golders Green area of London, and an arson attack on a synagogue in Skopje, the capital of North Macedonia. In London, two people have now been arrested on suspicion of an attempted arson attack on a synagogue in Finchley, north London — an incident police described as an antisemitic hate crime. Separately, three British nationals have been charged in connection with an attempted arson on the offices of Iran International, a Persian-language television channel critical of Tehran, in northwest London.

HAYI was entirely unknown before March and analysts at the International Centre for Counter-Terrorism (ICCT), a think tank based in The Hague funded largely by European governments, assess that it is not an independent terrorist organisation but rather a front for networks backed by Iran's clerical leadership. The claim rests partly on the speed with which HAYI's videos spread across Telegram and X accounts linked to pro-Iranian circles, and partly on the structure of the attacks themselves. Investigators in France arrested four suspects — one adult and three minors — after a foiled attack in Paris; the adult is alleged to have recruited the teenagers shortly before the incident and promised them between €500 and €1,000 to plant, ignite and film an explosive device. In the Netherlands, seven suspects aged between 17 and 23 were detained in connection with the Amsterdam school attack. The ICCT describes this approach as consistent with the use of locally recruited operatives rather than trained cells.

This tactic — sometimes called the use of "disposable agents" — targets young people or heavily indebted individuals who are recruited with promises of quick money, given instructions through encrypted and self-deleting chats, and often have no knowledge of the broader network behind their mission. Europol has warned that minors are particularly attractive to such networks because they typically lack criminal records and can provide little actionable intelligence if arrested. Sweden's domestic intelligence service noted as early as 2024 that Iran's government was using criminal networks to prepare or carry out violence against Israeli and Jewish targets in Europe.

While no direct, publicly documented evidence yet links the Iranian state to the command and control of these specific attacks, the concentrated timing, similar operational methods and the pro-Iranian digital ecosystem surrounding HAYI's communications point strongly in that direction. Analysts note that Iran has built and sustained networks of non-state proxies since the 1980s — from Hezbollah in Lebanon to armed groups in Iraq, Yemen and Gaza — and that coordinated pressure on Jewish and Israeli-linked targets abroad fits a well-established pattern of hybrid warfare. Regardless of who bears ultimate responsibility, the effect is plain: Jewish communities across Europe are living under heightened fear, and security services on the continent are scrambling to respond.