An Islamic ramming and stabbing attack aimed at Berlin’s Pride parade killed one person and injured 29 others. “On Saturday evening, a driver mowed down over a dozen people [later raised to 29] in Berlin’s Tiergarten park on the sidelines of the CSD parade. One woman died, and others sustained injuries, some of them serious,” German newspaper Die Welt reported.
The attacker, identified as a 21-year-old ‘German-Lebanese’ man, drove a van into the crowd and attacked people with a machete before fleeing. According to German state broadcaster ARD, “The suspect allegedly also lunged at passersby with a machete, said Federal Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt (CSU) in Berlin.”
Reuters covered the attack:
Germany’s government pledged to bring to justice those responsible for Saturday night’s deadly attack near a Pride event in Berlin, as police asked the public to help them track down a suspect they identified as an Islamist.A white vehicle ploughed into a crowd in the Tiergarten park near the city’s Brandenburg Gate at about 10 p.m. [local time] not far from one of Europe’s biggest annual LGBTQ Pride celebrations, Christopher Street Day. One person was killed and 16 injured, eight seriously, emergency services said.”This cowardly, despicable attack on people celebrating peacefully has shaken me to my core,” Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt said in a statement. “We will do everything to quickly investigate this horrific act and what lies behind it and bring those responsible to justice.”Berlin police said overnight they had identified a suspect who was previously known to them and part of the “Islamist spectrum”, later naming him as Abdul B and publishing his picture.
A city-wide manhunt is on for the suspect named Abdul Ballout with ties to the Islamic State (ISIS) terrorist group. He is a convicted criminal and had previously left Germany to fight for ISIS in Syria. “The suspect has a history of assault and robbery, and has links to the Islamist scene,” German newspaper Tagesspiegel reported. “Ballout reportedly sympathizes with the Islamic State. He had intended to travel to Syria in 2025 but was arrested in Lebanon and detained for three months. After his return to Germany, on account of being a German citizen, he was initially placed in pre-trial detention.”
UPDATE: German broadcaster ARD confirmed Sunday evening that fugitive has been killed in a police shootout in Berlin’s Spandau district.
Since the deadly Islamic terror attack on Berlin’s Christmas market in 2016, Germany has been fortifying public gatherings with armed guards and barricades. Cities across the country place security fences, concrete blocks, and even tank traps to prevent terrorists from mowing down passersby. As recent attacks show, these measures have failed to prevent such rammings.
“Islamist groups have stumbled upon a ‘successful strategy’ of plowing vehicles into the public at major events across Europe,” Germany’s state-run DW TV reported, quoting a security expert. “Germany has introduced barriers and other crowd protection infrastructure at major events following similar vehicle ramming atrocities.”
Uncontrolled migration from Muslim countries of North Africa and the Middle East has made the country vulnerable to future attacks. According to the broadcaster, Germany has “over 9,000 Islamist radicals with apparent violent inclinations.”
[German news reports translated by the author]
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