Knife-wielding man in Brussels asks passers-by if they are Jewish

This happened near Molenbeek last week. The only English reports I can find are two near identical articles in Jewish News/Times of Israel and The Jewish Telegraphic Agency.  The original report in Flemish is with Het Laatste Nieuws (HLN,) partly behind a paywall, and Google translate will only take you so far in understanding a piece of writing. 

 Belgian police arrested a Muslim man who asked passers-by on a Brussels street if they were Jewish while holding a knife and shouting about Allah. According to HLN the phrase was the ubiquitous Allah Akbar. 

Een getuige vertelt aan RTL dat de man voorbijgangers vroeg of ze Joods waren en “Allah Akbar” riep.

No one was hurt in the incident last week in Koekelberg, a north-western neighbourhood of the Belgian capital.

Toen agenten de man probeerden tegen te houden, rende hij weg. De politie kon hem in Sint-Jans- Molenbeek arresteren nadat ze hem meermaals moesten aanmanen zijn mes te laten vallen.

When officers tried to stop the man, he ran away. The police were able to arrest him in Sint-Jans-Molenbeek after they had to remind him several times to drop his knife.

The suspect is not considered a terrorist, a spokesman for the Brussels Prosecutor’s Office told HLN, though he is believed to have committed attempted murder “with connection to his religious or philosophical convictions.”

Also last week a man in Manchester stabbing with a knife, yelling “racial” remarks, but not named and taken straight to a mental hospital. There is a Europe wide theme of playing down these incidents.