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Chaos at the Christmas market: The unbelievable rampage in Magdeburg!
Confusion after the Magdeburg attack: Anti-Muslim terror or Islamist pattern? The background is unclear.
Chaos at the Christmas market: The unbelievable rampage in Magdeburg!
A nail in the flesh of the nation! A cruel attack occurred in the middle of the Magdeburg Christmas market, leaving people in shock. On Friday evening, a car drove recklessly through market visitors, ending in a bloodbath. The result of this rampage: at least two dead and numerous injured. The identity of the perpetrator: Taleb Al Abdulmohsen, a 50-year-old psychiatrist from Saudi Arabia. Unbelievable but true: This man had lived in Saxony-Anhalt since 2006 and was granted asylum in Germany in 2016 after turning away from his faith as an atheist and sharp critic of Islam. In an interview with the “Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung” he described himself as the “most aggressive critic of Islam in history” and feared persecution in his homeland.
But the nightmare continues: how Announcement.org reported, irritating details were revealed that cast Abdulmohsen's motives in a questionable light. Despite his radical criticism of Islam, he apparently had connections to IS sympathizers and expressed increasingly confused comments on social media, including menacing threats. Shortly before the attack, he spread an ominous code word, which culminated in a tornado of paranoia that ultimately claimed many victims. The attack could literally have been a textbook example of IS terrorist techniques, and questions about the alleged Islamist's true background are now high on the investigative authorities' agenda.
Missed warning signs?
Now the focus of the investigation is on the authorities, because the question hangs in the air: could the growing signals about Abdulmohsen have been followed more clearly? Interior Minister Nancy Faeser said decisively that additional investigations would reveal which authorities had prior knowledge of the perpetrator. ZDF reports that the Federal Office for Migration and Refugees (Bamf) had already received a tip about Abdulmohsen late last summer, but was advised that it had been forwarded to a corresponding investigative authority. What steps were taken as a result remains to be clarified.
This catastrophic incident is a serious example of the urgent need for action to monitor potential threats, not least to ensure the safety of citizens. Politicians are under massive pressure to provide answers and clarify responsibility before similar horror scenarios emerge.