MAGDEBURG: Ger­man authorities have started investigating a Saudi man with a history of anti-Islam rhetoric as the suspected driver in a car-ramming attack at a Christmas market in the city of Magdeburg which killed five people on Friday evening.

The attack on crowds of market visitors gathered to celebrate the pre-Christmas season comes amid a fierce debate over security and migration during an election campaign in Germany, where the far right is polling strongly.

“What a terrible act it is to injure and kill so many people there with such brutality,” Chancellor Olaf Scholz said in the central city, part of the former East Germany, where he laid a white rose at a church in honour of the victims.

“We have now learned that over 200 people have been inju­red,” he added. “Almost 40 are so seriously injured that we must be very worried about them.”

Suspect arrested

A 50-year-old Saudi doctor who has lived in Germany for almost two decades was arrested at the scene. Police searched his home overnight.

The motive remained unclear and police have not yet named the suspect. He has been named in German media as Taleb A.

A spokesperson for a specialist rehabilitation clinic for criminals with addictions in Bernburg confirmed that the suspect had worked as a psychiatrist for them, but had not been at work since October due to sickness and holiday leave.

Posts on his X account indicated support for anti-Islam and far-right parties, including the Alternative for Germany (AfD), as well as criticism of Germany for its handling of Saudi refugees.

German Interior Minister Nancy Faeser said the suspect’s Islamophobia was clear to see, but she declined to comment on motive.

Taleb A. appeared in a number of media interviews in 2019, including with German newspaper FAZ and the BBC, in which he spoke of his work as an activist helping Saudis and ex-Muslims flee to Europe.

A Saudi source said Riyadh had warned authorities in Berlin about the attacker after he posted extremist views on his personal X account that threatened peace and security.

These warnings were given multiple times since he left Saudi Arabia in 2006, the source said, without going into further detail.

‘No specific danger’

A risk assessment conducted last year by German state and federal criminal investigators came to the conclusion that the man posed “no specific danger”, the Welt newspaper reported, citing security sources.

Published in Dawn, December 22nd, 2024