Police probing arson at northwest London home as possible hate crime

Article content

Police have released a photograph of a suspect in an alleged hate-motivated arson at a northwest London home where pro-Palestinian signs had been stolen and damaged in the weeks leading up the weekend blaze.

Emergency crews were called Saturday at 10:38 p.m. to a fire at a house on Wateroak Drive, northeast of Fanshawe Park and Hyde Park roads, where neighbours tried to battle the blaze before firefighters arrived and doused it, police said. Nobody was injured and damage is estimated at $30,000.

Article content

“At this point in time, given what we know, we’re treating this as a possible hate-motivated incident,” London police Det.-Insp. Alex Krygsman said.

Signs supporting Palestine and the Afzaal family, four members of which were killed in a terrorist attack on June 6, 2021, were stolen from the home an hour before the fire, and other incidents involving signs at the house dating back to early May were reported to police, police said.

“We have reason to believe that it’s likely the same person,” Krygsman said of the suspect in the fire and sign incidents.

Investigators released a photo of the suspect, who is described as a man between 30 and 50, with a medium to heavy build. He was wearing grey shoes, dark pants, a light-grey zip-up sweater with black accents under the arms, a dark-coloured toque and a medical mask.

Hikma Public Affairs Council, an advocacy group for London and area Muslims, decried the arson as especially troubling because it comes just days after the third anniversary of the attack on the Afzaal family.

“. . . These kinds of incidents are still out there and these kinds of aggressions are still happening despite all the calls for fighting hate,” spokesperson Nawaz Tahir said.

Article content

Article content

Talat Afzaal, 74, her son Salman Afzaal, 46, his wife Madiha Salman, 44, and their daughter Yumnah, 15, were struck and killed by a pickup truck at the corner of Hyde Park and South Carriage roads while out for a walk. Nathaniel Veltman, 22, a white nationalist who harboured intense resentment toward Muslims, was sentenced to 25 years in prison for the murders and the attempted murder of a young child who survived.

Tahir voiced concern the Wateroak Drive arson could make people who display signs supporting Palestine or other Muslim countries feel at risk.

“I think every incident like this chips away at the whole framework of safety and security in the community,” he said. “And this is particularly egregious. Setting fire to somebody’s house is next level.”

Sunday, workers could be seen boarding up the front door at the fire-damaged home. The area surrounding the entrance to the two-storey house was stained black from smoke.

Family members at the home declined an interview request.

Hakim has reached out to the family and offered them support, Tahir said.

“We know they are concerned for their safety and concerned for the safety of their neighbourhood,” said Tahir, who declined to confirm whether the family is Muslim. “They were definitely a family that supported Our London family and they definitely were in support of human rights for Palestinians.”

Article content

The arson rattled residents on the street, where one neighbor said a pro-Palestinian sign was also stolen from his front lawn Saturday night.

The man, who didn’t want to be identified, said he discovered the sign was gone after he heard sirens and came outside to discover smoke coming from a nearby home. “It was insane,” he said.

The family who lives at the home, a couple and their three daughters, weren’t home at the time, he said.

Police set up a mobile command centre in a nearby parking lot and there was a large police presence in the neighbourhood. An officer was seen collecting a pro-Palestinian sign from another neighbour’s home and placing it into an evidence bag.

“This is an investigation that is the priority for our police service right now,” Krygsman said, noting Chief Thai Truong was briefed on the investigation and has been in contact with Mayor Josh Morgan and city council.

“We want to demonstrate to the community, this neighbourhood here, that we here. We are taking this seriously,” Krygsman said.

Hate crimes jumped by nearly 40 per cent in London last year, with the Israel-Hamas war cited as contributing factor, according to a report presented to the city’s police board last month. London police recorded 111 hate- and bias-related crimes in 2023, up from 80 the year before and 30 five years ago, statistics show.

Article content

Members of the Muslim community were the third-most targeted group, with 29 occurrences – a figure that includes both hate crimes and incidents that are hate-motivated but aren’t considered criminal offences – reported last year, representing a 263 per cent increase.

Nearly two-thirds of those occurrences happened after Oct. 7, when the Palestinian militant group Hamas attacked Israel, killing more than 1,200 people and prompting Israel to invade Gaza, where Israeli bombardment and ground operations have killed more than 36,000 people, according to local health officials.

Anyone with information about the suspect in Saturday’s fire is asked to contact London police at 519-661-5670 or Crime Stoppers at 1-800-222-TIPS (8477).

dcarruthers@postmedia.com

Article content