After a naturalized migrant rammed into a Michigan synagogue, officials found an Israeli airstrike had killed some of his relatives. Now, the Israeli Defense Forces said one of those killed was his brother, who was a Hezbollah terrorist.
Ayman Mohamad Ghazali, a 41-year-old U.S. citizen from Lebanon, died after crashing into the Temple Israel synagogue with a car full of explosives on March 12, as The Dallas Express reported. Initial reports suggested Israel killed four of his relatives in a Lebanese airstrike.
The Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) said March 15 that his brother was Hezbollah Commander Ibrahim Muhammad Ghazali – “responsible for managing weapons operations” in the group’s “Badr Unit.”
“The unit is responsible for launching hundreds of rockets toward Israeli civilians throughout the war,” the IDF wrote on X. “Ibrahim was eliminated in an IAF strike on a Hezbollah military structure last week.”
The Badr Unit works to launch long-range rockets into Northern Israel and to support ground units against potential Israeli advances, according to Eye On Hezbollah, a project of the nonprofit anti-Iran interest group “United Against Nuclear Iran.” The unit was initially deployed along the border, but in May 2017, it was operating “deep into Syria,” near Aleppo.
The U.S. government considers Hezbollah a foreign terror organization, citing its attacks against Western targets, backing from Iran, and support for regional terror groups, including Hamas. In November 2025, the Treasury Department sanctioned people who allegedly funneled tens of millions of dollars from Iran to Hezbollah that year.
Ghazali arrived in the United States in 2011 on an immediate relative visa as the spouse of a U.S. citizen, as The Dallas Express reported. Officials granted him citizenship in 2016.
The night of the attack, authorities reportedly raided Ghazali’s home in Dearborn Heights. A Facebook account by the same name as the suspect, based in Dearborn, includes posts about Lebanon and conflict in the Middle East.
FBI-Detroit Special Agent in Charge Jennifer Runyan said in a press conference that it was too early to determine a motive, but said investigators were considering the attack as a “targeted act of violence against the Jewish community.”