By Thomas Escritt and Rachel More
MAGDEBURG, Germany (Reuters) – Authorities were investigating a Saudi doctor with a history of anti-Islam rhetoric as the suspected driver of a car attack at a Christmas market in the German city of Magdeburg that killed five people and injured scores.
Friday night’s attack on crowds gathered for Christmas celebrations could intensify a heated debate in Germany over security and immigration ahead of February’s federal election, with opinion polls suggesting the far right will do strongly.
Authorities said Saturday that the motive was unclear. However, Magdeburg prosecutor Horst Nopens said a possible factor could be the suspect’s frustration with Germany’s treatment of Saudi refugees.
The suspect, a 50-year-old psychiatrist who has lived in Germany for nearly two decades, was arrested at the scene after the three-minute attack in the city center that shocked the country. The police did not name the suspect, the German media only identified him as Taleb A.
The driver used emergency exit points to slowly maneuver the vehicle toward the market before speeding up and plunging into the crowd, a city police official told reporters.
Those killed included a nine-year-old child and four adults, Magdeburg city official Ronni Krug said, adding that about 41 of the injured had either serious or life-threatening injuries.
“I don’t know about you, but I associate the Christmas market with mulled wine and bratwurst, and yesterday people died in this area. Others are fighting for their lives,” said Krug.
Authorities closed the market for the rest of the season.
“What a terrible act it is to injure and kill so many people with such brutality,” Chancellor Olaf Scholz said during a visit to the city, where he laid a white rose at a church.
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German Interior Minister Nancy Faeser said the suspect’s Islamophobia was clear, but declined to comment on the motive.
Friedrich Merz, opposition leader of the Christian Democrats and current favorite to succeed Scholz as chancellor, warned against drawing hasty conclusions.
“Yesterday’s terrible act in Magdeburg does not fit the familiar pattern,” he said.
Taleb A. appeared in several media interviews in 2019, including with the FAZ and the BBC, in which he spoke about his work as an activist who helps Saudi Arabia and people turned away from Islam escape to Europe.
“There is no such thing as good Islam,” he told the FAZ at the time.
A Saudi source told Reuters that Saudi Arabia warned German authorities about the suspect after he posted extremist views on his X account that threatened peace and security.
According to a German security source, Saudi authorities sent several tips in 2023 and 2024 and forwarded them to the responsible security authorities.
A risk assessment carried out last year by the state and federal criminal police came to the conclusion that the man posed “no specific danger,” the newspaper “Welt” reported, citing security circles.
Both the German domestic and foreign secret services did not want to comment on the investigation. State and federal criminal investigation offices did not respond to Reuters’ request for comment.
“CHILDREN SCREAMING”
Andrea Reis was at the market on Friday and returned on Saturday with her daughter Julia to lay a candle next to the church overlooking the grounds, saying she narrowly escaped the car getting in the way.
Tears streamed down her face as she described the scene. “Children scream, cry for mom. “You can’t forget that,” she said.
Scholz’s Social Democrats are trailing both the far-right AfD and the leading conservative opposition in opinion polls ahead of new elections scheduled for February 23.
The AfD, which is particularly popular in the former East, is a pioneer in calls for tough action against immigration.
Its chancellor candidate Alice Weidel and her co-chair Tino Chrupalla issued a statement condemning the attack.
