A Syrian asylum seeker who blew himself up outside a German music festival had made a video pledging allegiance to the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) group, authorities said Monday, in the second attack claimed by the jihadists in Germany in a week.
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The Ansbach attacker, who was identified only as Mohammad D in accordance with German privacy laws, was a rejected asylum seeker in Germany who was due to be deported to Bulgaria, where he already had been granted asylum, authorities said. It has since been reported that the bomber was earlier refused entry into a music festival, where more than 2,000 were gathered.
Bavarian Interior Minister Joachim Herrmann told a separate press conference in Nuremberg on Monday that a video was found on the attacker’s mobile phone.
But in an indication the group may not have been directly involved in planning the attack, it identified him as one of those who had answered its call to target countries that are part of the global coalition against it.
But the fact that recent migrants were involved in three of the four prominent attacks over the last week was certain to reignite debate about immigration – Bavaria has been a point of entry and a destination for numerous more than 1 million migrants who have sought refuge in Germany since the start of past year.
Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere on Monday cautioned Germans against indiscriminately branding all refugees a security threat after a rash of attacks over the last week.
Herrmann said the man’s request for asylum was rejected a year ago, and a spokesman for Germany’s interior ministry said he had received two deportation notices.
Constant attacks have shocked Germany.
The Islamic State group claimed both attacks.
He was generally a “friendly and happy” person, Mahmood said. “This morning there were a lot of police cars, and so I felt that ‘yes, this is how it was in Jerusalem when I was there past year.’…”
The attacker was only able to kill himself during the suicide bombing near an Ansbach wine bar, though he did injure approximately 15 bystanders.
The IS-linked Aamaq news agency said the man carried out the attack in response to calls by the group to target countries of the US -led coalition that is fighting IS.
The bombing at the music festival followed a shooting spree at a shopping centre in Munich on Friday, in which an 18-year-old man shot dead nine people before killing himself. The attacker, a 27-year-old Syrian denied asylum in Germany, might also have mental disorder.
De Maiziere called for Germany’s borders to be better protected without preventing people from coming in by legal and safe means “in reasonable numbers”.
In a nation grappling with massive backlog of hundreds of thousands of asylum applications, the attack prompted a chorus of voices critical of German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s initial decision to welcome refugees and others during a huge surge into Europe a year ago.
“He always said, ‘Isis is not Islam, they don’t represent Islam'”, Alireza Khodadadi told Die Welt. As evidence unfolds it is starting to become clear the motive behind the horrific attack was likely terrorism.
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“A link with worldwide terrorism, or to Islamic State, can not be ruled out any more than personal instability on the part of the assailants”, said de Maiziere, referring to the Sunday attacks.
