Worshippers Stop Ax Wielding Attacker At Canadian Mosque

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One worshipper knocked the ax from the man’s hands and held him down until police arrived local media reports.

A 24-year-old man was arrested at the scene in the suburb of Mississauga, and he has since been charged.

Some congregants had minor injuries from the bear spray, the mosque’s imam said.

One of the worshippers said the experience was “terrifying” and described hearing a scream before turning around to see a man holding an ax and using bear spray – similar to pepper spray – against three people.

“By the time he was spraying, the people in the first row realized something was going on and one of the young men turned around and knocked away the ax before he had a chance to use it,” Noorani Sairally told Canadian newspaper The Globe and Mail.

Canada’s Muslim community has been targeted in a number of deadly attacks, including in 2017 when a shooting at a Quebec City mosque killed six people and left another eight wounded.

And last year, four members of the same Muslim family were killed after a vehicle hit them in London, Ontario, which was described by police as a deliberate Islamophobic attack.