Authorities in Verona, Italy, apprehended a 16-year-old from Bologna on Wednesday for possessing extremist materials related to jihadism and terrorism.
The decision to arrest the minor, who has not been identified, is based on an investigation that began in the fall of 2025, aided by the Bologna police.
Officials indicated that this investigation was part of routine efforts to monitor “supremacist online channels.” They particularly focused on one user who had shared a manual on committing acts of violence with heavy vehicles, along with tips for maintaining anonymity online.
Verona police reported that further inquiries led to the identification of the account holder as the 16-year-old from Bologna. As per reports, the minor is currently in custody at a temporary detention facility in Ancona. Local judicial authorities have confirmed the arrest and have imposed a two-month ban on the minor’s access to electronic devices and the internet.
“During a search of the minor’s residence, officers discovered numerous handwritten sheets featuring drawings, symbols, and emblems linked to white supremacist ideology, as well as a typed page detailing how to create a homemade bulletproof vest,” the Verona police stated.
“An extensive analysis of the teenager’s smartphone uncovered a significant amount of material pertinent to our investigation,” they added. “This included not just various forms of white supremacist and jihadist propaganda, but also manuals for making homemade weapons, documents translated from Cyrillic characters detailing corrosive chemicals, and guides on assembling explosive devices.”
The police noted that their investigation also turned up a full video of the Christchurch massacre from 2019, accompanied by messages idolizing the attackers as role models.
Additionally, the Verona police reported that intercepted conversations among minors revealed plans to “reestablish a clandestine organization in the nation,” which mentioned using homemade weapons and plotting violence against certain individuals, including “notable judges and journalists.”
“The findings appear to suggest a blending of content related to white supremacist extremism and jihadist propaganda, often referred to by counterterrorism experts as ‘white jihad.’ This term describes the merging of seemingly disparate ideologies united by a shared admiration for violence as a form of ideological expression,” stated the Verona police.
Moreover, this arrest follows the recent capture of Zakaria Ben-Hadi, a 21-year-old individual from Moroccan immigrant parents in Vimercate, in the Brianza region. Ben Hadi was apprehended after investigators found he had authored social media content that “celebrated martyrdom” and called for terrorist actions against Western nations and Christians.
His social media postings also hinted at plans to execute a terrorist attack in Italy, echoing the car rampage carried out by 31-year-old Salim El-Khudri in Modena on May 15.
