Will the Christmas market attack further divide Germans over immigration?
Magdeburg has been in grief since the attack that killed a nine-year-old and four-year-old boy at a Christmas market on Friday afternoon.
About 200 people were also injured when a man rammed a car into the busy market in the eastern German city.
The suspect, Taleb al-Abdulmohsen, a 50-year-old Saudi psychiatrist who has lived in Germany since 2006, faces murder and manslaughter charges.
Political parties across the spectrum have expressed sorrow for the victims and promised to step up security.
In a statement shared with Al Jazeera, Greens party leader Robert Habeck said he wished the city “comfort, strength and confidence”. Chancellor Olaf Scholz called the incident a “terrible and insane” act.
Nicole Anger, an MP and co-chair of the Die Linke (Left) party in Magdeburg, said the city remained calm and other people remained stunned.
“There are candlelight vigils and many moments of solidarity. Vendors at the Christmas market, which is closed the rest of the year, hand out free fruits and vegetables,” he told Al Jazeera.
But while many are united in grief, tensions are rising.
Parallel to the vigils, more than 2,000 far-right supporters holding signs and chanting anti-immigration slogans gathered in the city on Saturday.
Other rallies would be for Monday.
Anger, who was born and raised in Magdeburg, said the atmosphere reminded her of the mid-1990s when one man was killed after far-right agitators chased a group of Black men through the city in what has come to be known as Himmelfahrtskrawalle, or the Magdeburg Ascension Day riots.
“Right now, young people and other people of immigrant background are afraid of ending up on the streets,” he said.
The attack took place as Germans prepared to close off a heated political year.
After the collapse of the Scholz-led coalition in November, the chancellor held a vote of confidence in mid-December, prompting early elections.
Germans will go to the polls on February 23.
Meanwhile, the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party continues to gain political ground following its successes in this year’s regional elections.
The day before the attack, US billionaire Elon Musk stirred controversy by posting on the X social media platform he owns: “Only the AfD can save Germany.”
Observers have described a sense of worry and worry, saying that a blame game over the Magdeburg attack may simply distract from the main issues facing the German electorate.
“We still have to be very careful about the true motivations of the attacker. But what is evident is that if there is an extremist force in the political discourse that is not only Islamophobic but also phobic towards all foreigners, if it expresses itself so strongly, as the AfD systematically does, it has an impact,” said Justus von Daniels. , editor-in-chief of the German publication Correctiv, who in January announced a meeting between AfD and neo-Nazi activists to discuss a “master plan” for the expulsion of immigrants.
According to him, the way in which Germany is acting lately in terms of strengthening security will be revealing.
As the elections approach, political parties deserve to avoid banking on the AfD’s anti-immigration narrative and focus on the problems facing the electorate, von Daniels said.
“The economy plays a role in these elections, and a case like Magdeburg shifts the public discourse towards migratory factors. If the AfD tries to push the migration factor further, I am worried that the other political parties will react, which is not healthy for the political debate. “
The suspect and his possible motives have puzzled authorities and the public.
Al-Abdulmohsen has described himself as a former Muslim activist on social media. Their messages showed contempt for Islam and right-wing ideologies. He said he sent text messages to women fleeing Saudi Arabia, but a Correctiv journalist who was in contact with him disputed this claim, reporting that several women blocked him because he was “behaving in a problematic manner. “Array Some said they felt sexually harassed through him.
Saudi Arabia said it had warned Germany of the doctor’s presence in November 2023. Germany claimed to have received the information, but in the end Al-Abdulmohsen did not appear to be a risk at the time.
Tahir Abbas, a professor of Islamophobia and political violence at Leiden University in the Netherlands, said the suspect appears to have “a bit of admiration for ethno-nationalist populist ideals. “
“I think it has the effect of more broadly aligning the motivations of this specific writer with far-right practices and ideologies, in addition to the protection of women,” she said.
“The far right is so hypernormalised across Europe and North America at the moment that there are tremendous challenges that have emerged and will continue to emerge, particularly as President Donald Trump takes the helm in the US again.”
The suspect has made his admiration for far-right European leaders, such as Dutchman Geert Wilders, transparent on social media. Since the attack, the far-right in Germany and across Europe has been quick to use the attack as a weapon to publicize its anti-migration agenda, observers say.
Jorinde Schulz, activist and member of the Left party, stated that “the right can mobilize almost without obstacles. “
“For them, this attack is a stepping stone to gain more support, which is all the more disturbing since they are the ones who are going to attack people of colour in the street and intimidate political activists.”
On Sunday, police in Bremerhaven, a port town in northern Gerguyy, arrested a man who turned to TikTok to threaten violence. The man allegedly warned that he would stab an Arab-looking man in the city on Christmas Day, Gerguy news agency reported, dpa.