FIRST READING: Yet another Canadian massacre prevented at the last minute by police

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TOP STORY

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Once again, a potential Canadian massacre appears to have been halted within seconds of disaster by the quick actions of police.

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On Sunday night, congregants at a Yom Kippur service at a Belleville, Ont., synagogue dropped for cover at the sound of gunfire  outside the building.

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Multiple witness accounts described one large boom, likely from a shotgun, followed quickly by pops, possibly from a pistol.

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The next day, investigators revealed that a gunman had opened fire on a Belleville Police Service officer with the apparent intention of then turning his gun on the approximately 25 congregants massed in the Sons of Jacob synagogue.

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Instead, the wounded officer, Const. Jeff Smith, was able to return fire and hold back the attacker. In conjunction with a second officer who scrambled to the scene, Smith was able to subdue the shooter, who was hit multiple times.

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“It’s believed that the individual came in a truck and he had a shotgun and he discharged his firearm at a police officer,” Kristy Denette, a spokesperson for Ontario’s Special Investigations Unit, told reporters.

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Denette added that it was “common sense” to suggest that the shooter had targeted the officer as a prelude to attacking the synagogue.

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Police identified the suspected gunman as 29-year-old Sean Ward of nearby Quinte West.

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The response to the Sons of Jacob incident is reminiscent of a 2017 ISIS-inspired terror attack in Edmonton. There again, an assailant initiated an attempt at a civilian massacre, only to have the effort thwarted by a frontline police officer.

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Abdulahi Sharif, a Somalian national who had claimed asylum in Canada just five years prior, began his attack by driving a Chevrolet Malibu into Const. Michael Chernyk, 48, an Edmonton Police officer performing traffic control for an Edmonton Eskimos game at Commonwealth Stadium.

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After striking Chernyk with the car, Sharif then stabbed the officer at least three times in the head with a kitchen knife in an attempt to steal his service pistol.

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Instead, the badly wounded Chernyk not only protected his firearm, but was able to overpower Sharif and get control of the knife.

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Chernyk would testify later that he was a single father of two children, and had been “trying to survive for my kids.”

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Had the struggle gone differently, Sharif would have found himself armed with a 15-shot Glock 22 and facing streets packed with football crowds.

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In 2014, a quick police response was also credited in limiting the carnage caused by an Islamist terrorist attack on Parliament Hill.

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The shooter murdered Nathan Cirillo, a sentry stationed at Ottawa’s Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, before gaining access to the Centre Block of Parliament armed with a lever-action rifle.

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As MPs and political staffers barricaded themselves in nearby meeting rooms, RCMP officers engaged the attacker in a shootout.

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A subsequent investigation determined that the gunman was ultimately killed by bullets from two responders: Sergeant-at-Arms Kevin Vickers, and the RCMP’s Curtis Barrett, who was reported to have “perforated” the attacker with shots as he was distracted by a lunging attack from Vickers.