A 45-year-old British man pleaded not guilty Friday to two counts of attempted murder over a knife attack that left two Jewish men wounded in north London in April, Reuters reported.
Prosecutors said the case is no longer being treated as terrorism.
Essa Suleiman, who was born in Somalia, is accused of stabbing the two men in Golders Green on April 29. The attack occurred amid a series of incidents targeting Jewish sites in the area, which has a large Jewish community.
Appearing briefly at London’s Old Bailey, Suleiman denied the two attempted murder charges. He also pleaded not guilty to a third attempted murder charge stemming from a separate incident at the home of a former acquaintance earlier that day, as well as a charge of possessing a bladed article.
Police initially investigated the Golders Green attack as suspected terrorism. However, prosecutor Deanna Heer told the court Friday that the Crown Prosecution Service had reviewed the case and determined there was insufficient evidence to establish a terrorist connection to the stabbings.
Suleiman was ordered to remain in custody. He is due back in court on January 15, with his trial scheduled to begin in March.
The attack in Golders Green prompted the UK to raise its national terrorism threat level from "substantial" to "severe," marking the first such increase in more than four years.
The stabbing followed an arson attack several weeks earlier in the same London neighborhood that destroyed four ambulances belonging to the Jewish Hatzolah emergency medical charity.
Britain recorded the highest per-capita rate of violent antisemitic attacks in the world in 2025, with 121 severe assaults recorded among a Jewish population of roughly 300,000.
(Arutz Sheva-Israel National News' North American desk is keeping you updated until the start of Sukkot in New York. The time posted automatically on all Israel National News articles, however, is Israeli time.)