A Syrian refugee was arrested after killing a Polish woman with a large kebab knife in the southwestern city of Reutlingen and a failed Syrian asylum seeker set off an explosive device near an open-air music festival in the southern city of Ansbach, southern Germany. It appeared to be the same as the one found by German investigators on the suicide bomber’s phone.
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Amaq reported that an “insider source” said the attacker “carried out the operation in response to calls to target countries of the coalition that fights Islamic State”.
The man said the attack would be committed in the name of Allah as retaliation for the killing of Muslims and pledged allegiance to IS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. The attacker, identified as an Iranian-German who was born and raised in Germany, had no apparent connection with a terror organization, police said. However, the bomber was refused entry into an Ansbach music festival where roughly 2500 people were in attendance. More than 2,000 people visited the festival each day July 22-24.
Roman Fertinger, deputy police chief of nearby Nuremberg, said it was clear the suspect wanted to kill others, not just himself, in Sunday’s attack.
Horst Seehofer, the governor of Bavaria – where three of last week’s attacks took place – told the daily Sueddeutsche Zeitung Tuesday: “we must know who is in our country”. “Given the current evidence, there is no indication that this was a terrorist attack”, a police spokesman stated. “But our constitutional order will not yield”.
Police concluded that the incident, in which three others were injured, was likely a “crime of passion”. After refusal past year, a third attempt to deport him was looming.
Germany tried to deport him to Bulgaria where his asylum application had been approved, said De Maiziere.
“He always said, ‘Isis is not Islam, they don’t represent Islam'”, Alireza Khodadadi told Die Welt.
Ansbach has a population of about 40,000 and is a major USA military garrison town, with around 5,000 members of the military living there along with civilians, contractors and retirees.
Sunday’s attack was Germany’s fourth bloody incident in a week. The bomber, who was killed, had reportedly pledged his allegiance to the Islamic State terror group.
In Ansbach, eyewitnesses said the blast was so strong they felt it in their bodies.
“A security man ran to the entrance. Two people lay on the ground with head and neck injuries”, said eyewitness Kevin Krieger to Sat-1 television.
“Nothing can be covered up but nothing should be exaggerated”.
More than a million refugees have entered Germany in the past year, many of them braving the treacherous waters of the Mediterranean Sea in search of better lives in Germany and other European countries.
In Berlin on Monday, Germany’s interior minister, Thomas de Maizière, cautioned that “in the Ansbach incident, neither a link to worldwide Islamic State terrorism nor a mental disorder of the perpetrator can be ruled out”, adding, “It could be a combination of both”.
Meanwhile police released more details on Munich mall attacker David Ali Sonboly, saying the 18-year-old was depressed and had spent two months in a psychiatric unit last year.
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While Germany has suffered suicide bombings by the far-Right in the past, this is believed to be the first such attack by Islamists.
