A Toronto father and son have been arrested while allegedly in the “advanced stages” of planning a violent attack and charged with multiple terrorism-related offences, the RCMP said.
Ahmed Fouad Mostafa Eldidi, 62, and Mostafa Eldidi, 26, face nine charges in total, including one count each of conspiracy to commit murder for or on the orders of a terrorist group — namely the Islamic State, a militant Sunni Muslim organization.
RCMP Assistant Commissioner Matt Peggs announced the charges during a press conference on Wednesday.
The duo were arrested on July 28 in a hotel room in Richmond Hill, Ontario, after a month-long investigation involving multiple police agencies, Peggs said.
The alleged attack is believed to be aimed at Toronto, RCMP Supt. James Parr said, though the exact nature of the threat is under a publication ban. Parr said there is no ongoing danger to city residents.
The pair also face weapons charges for possessing an axe and a machete, which they had with them at the hotel when they were arrested, Parr said.
“As you know, they were accused of having certain weapons. In other words, we’re pretty sure how close they were to going from simply having those tools to carrying out that threat,” Parr said when asked what kind of attack the pair were allegedly planning.
Court documents filed with the Ontario Superior Court of Justice show the duo live at the same address in Scarborough, an eastern suburb of Toronto. Parr declined to say whether anyone else lives at the address.
According to Parr, both men are Canadian citizens. He does not know if they also have Canadian citizenship from another country.
Neither man was known to police before the investigation began in early July, Parr said. He would not say what prompted police to launch the investigation.
“So the RCMP receives information in a number of ways and that could be through tipsters. It could be through other government agencies and partners. Again, given the way this has unfolded, I’m going to limit my comment at this time,” Parr told reporters.
The indictment also alleges that Ahmad Fouad Mostafa Eldidi carried out a serious attack on behalf of the Islamic State somewhere outside Canada in 2015.
When asked how investigators became aware of the alleged incident, Parr indicated that civilians and government officials from the RCMP’s Integrated National Security Enforcement Team “put the pieces together” that led to that specific charge.
The pair are currently in police custody and are due to appear in court again on Thursday.
At the height of its power in late 2014 and 2015, the Islamic State imposed a reign of terror on millions of people and claimed control over large parts of the combined territory of Iraq and Syria.
Its fighters repeatedly defeated the armies of both countries and launched or inspired attacks in dozens of cities around the world.
Its leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, declared his cross-border caliphate from the pulpit of Iraq’s historic al-Nuri Mosque in 2014, vowing to rule it. Five years later, he was killed in a U.S. special forces raid in northwestern Syria.
The caliphate collapsed in Iraq, where it once had a base just a 30-minute drive from Baghdad, and in Syria after a sustained military campaign by a US-led coalition.