A fake news was being reported in the Israeli newspaper Arutz Sheva. Which says the two men had been arrested after sitting on a bench outside a Vienna synagogue, armed with knives. It is believed that the incident was nothing more than an Internet rumor, which was spread by the Israeli news source. Prevailing rumor was that two Afghan men had been arrested carrying knives outside a synagogue in Vienna were being turned down by Austrian police on Saturday evening.
Saturday evening is the beginning of the Jewish festival of Hanukkah, which commemorates the re-dedication of the Second Temple in Jerusalem. According to police sources on Saturday evening, they were unaware of any official reports, and were in the process of confirming the situation. They denied that no incident occurred when contacted on Sunday morning. The paper reported that when a security guard approached the two men to ask what they were doing near the synagogue, they said they were Jews waiting for the rabbi and other members of the congregation. The guard notified the local police, who were stationed nearby. The paper further reported that one of the suspects already known to the authorities.
The Israelitische Kultusgemeinde Vienna (IKV) assured the members of its community on Saturday evening, “that there never was such an incident”, according to a report in the Wiener Zeitung. Due to past threats, Vienna’s synagogues and some embassies have an around-the-clock police presence, especially in the wake of the recent events in Berlin.