Terror plot targeting staff at Jewish school in Azerbaijan foiled

Haaretz reports that the authorities in Azerbaijan have foiled an Iranian terror plot to kill staff at a Jewish school in Baku:

Three men were detained last week after planning to attack two Israelis employed by a Jewish school in Baku, the Azerbaijan Ministry of National Security has revealed. Meanwhile, an Azeri commentator considered close to the republic's president has launched a scathing indictment of Iran.

The Azeri ministry said it had arrested a cell that planned to "kill public activists," before it became apparent that the intended victims were two Israeli Chabad emissaries, a rabbi and a teacher employed by the "Chabad Or Avner" Jewish school in Baku. The ministry said that the three men, named as Rasim Aliyev, Ali Huseynov and Balaqardash Dadashov, received smuggled arms and equipment from Iranian agents. The action was apparently planned as retaliation to the gunning down of Iranian nuclear scientists.

"The Azeri security forces acted covertly without alerting us," said Rabbi Shneor Segal, one of the two targets. "It was published that they originally planned to attack 'people who look Jewish and hold foreign passports,' near the school, but when the school guards began suspecting them, they started monitoring the area where I live," he told Haaretz.

Segal added that the second target was Rabbi Mati Lewis.

This is not the first example of terrorists targeting Jewish schools or their staff. CST's report (pdf) on the history of anti-Jewish terrorism, Terrorist Incidents against Jewish Communities and Israeli Citizens Abroad 1968-2010, includes 16 examples of Jewish schools being targeted for terrorist attack.