Berlin is in shock after the attack on the “Christopher Street Day” (CSD) parade on Saturday. Hundreds of thousands of people were peacefully celebrating and advocating for the rights of gay people – until around 10 p.m., an attacker drove his vehicle into the crowd in the Tiergarten park right in the middle of the city.
One woman died and 29 others were injured, some seriously. Authorities immediately said the incident was a terrorist act committed by an Islamist. The suspect initially managed to escape but was later killed by police.
On Sunday afternoon, during a memorial service at St. Mary’s Church (Marienkirche), just a short distance from the Brandenburg Gate, Chancellor Friedrich Merz (CDU) said: “We will do everything to defend the freedom of our country and our society – everything!” He called on mourners: “Stand together, celebrate and show the joyful face of our open, free society.” Still, no one feels like celebrating right now.
This sentiment was also echoed by the opposition. Socialist Left Party leader Luigi Pentisano said, “Hate must never triumph.” He added, “Whether the hatred stems from religious fanaticism or whether the attacks and hostility come from elsewhere.”
the suspect was known to the police
The suspected perpetrator was a 21-year-old German national, born to a woman of Lebanese origin. Police knew him to be a sympathizer of “Islamic State” (IS), an Islamic terrorist militia in Syria. In the summer of 2025, he attempted to travel to Syria via Türkiye and Lebanon to join IS fighters. However, he was detained in Lebanon, brought back to Germany in November 2025 and held in pre-trial detention.
He was tried in Berlin on charges of preparation for a serious act of violence. Prosecutors sought a prison sentence of two years and ten months. However, the court released the youth, giving him a suspended sentence of one year and ten months. The IS supporter was released in mid-May this year – after prosecutors appealed the decision.
Although the man’s phone was wiretapped for some time, he was not subject to widespread surveillance.
On independence despite obvious IS sympathies? This must not happen again, Federal Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt of the conservative Christian Social Union (CSU) said on Sunday: “Part of the review process will determine whether suspended sentences are really justified in such cases,” Dobrindt told the public broadcaster. ZDF. “It is simply a matter of being able to restrict the freedom of movement of such individuals,” Dobrindt concluded.
The main opposition party, the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), called the security policy a complete failure. AfD internal policy spokesman Martin Hess said, “If an Islamist ‘threat actor’ known to the police was capable of committing such an act, there must be a thorough investigation into why he was able to leave in the first place.”
Environmentalist Constantin von Notz of the Green Party called for more powers for security agencies to deal with violent Islamists and drew parallels to previous incidents: “It shocks one completely that this clearly involves another ‘person of interest’ who was already on the radar of the authorities,” the Green Party politician said.
criminal case under investigation
“What really happened after his release from prison? Who did he maintain contact with? Even if he was under surveillance, there was clearly a gap here; this is what we need to investigate minutely – and rest assured, we will,” said Sebastian Fiedler of the centre-left Social Democratic Party (SPD), which is currently part of the federal government as a junior coalition partner of the conservative CDU/CSU bloc.
“Overall, our criminal laws are very liberal with respect to terrorism,” Peter Newman, a terrorism expert at King’s College London, told public broadcaster ZDF. He said prison sentences in Germany are short by European standards, especially when compared to France and the United Kingdom.
However, many experts also point out that it is difficult to maintain widespread surveillance of individuals who have not been sentenced to prison by German courts. Germany’s domestic intelligence agency, the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution, estimates that approximately 420 individuals are currently classified in Germany as “Islamic security threats” – a term that refers to people whom authorities believe are capable of committing terrorist acts. It is not clear whether suspected criminal Abdul B* was among them. However, security experts estimate that placing all such individuals under round-the-clock surveillance would completely overwhelm the authorities – especially given that the total number of potentially violent Islamists in Germany is estimated to be quite high, around 9,000 people.
Dirk Peglow, President of the Association of German Criminal Investigators (BDK) said Handelsblatt The newspaper said on Monday: “In the case of an individual posing such a high level of risk, release from custody should not mean the end of state surveillance.” However, Peglow also pointed out that if authorities are expected to monitor particularly dangerous individuals for long periods of time, state security and surveillance units must be “appropriately equipped in terms of personnel, technology and organization” – which they are not currently.
The court had ordered the youth to attend a total of 26 appointments at the Anti-Radicalisation Centre. Abdul Bi had already completed two of these; A third consultation session was scheduled for that Monday. There is now widespread criticism as to whether such training actually serves its purpose.
This article has been translated from German.
*DW hides the full names of criminals to avoid increasing their publicity and increasing the possibility of copycat killers.