A Sunday night shooting near a synagogue in the southern Ontario city of Belleville has left two people injured, including a local police officer, authorities said. The shooting occurred around 7:10 p.m. EDT in the area of Bleecker and Victoria avenues, the police department for the city of Belleville, located about 118 miles northeast of Toronto, said in a statement, adding that a police officer and an unidentified individual sustained injuries.
Both were transferred to the hospital, where the man was in life-threatening condition, according to Ontario’s civilian police oversight agency, the Special Investigations Unit, which said in a statement that it was investigating the shooting. The condition of the police officer was not made public. “Investigators en route to scene,” it said. Circumstances surrounding the shooting — which occurred near the Sons of Jacob synagogue and on the night of Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the year in Judaism — were not immediately clear. Ontario Gov. Doug Ford said online that he was “disgusted” by the shooting and that his thoughts were with the Jewish community in Belleville and across the province.
