Vehicle plows into crowded Christmas market in Germany

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At least two people were killed, including a small child, and more than 60 were injured when a car plowed through a crowded Christmas market in eastern Germany on Friday, officials said.

The suspected driver, identified as a doctor from Saudi Arabia who lived in Germany, was detained, said Reiner Haseloff, premier of the state of Saxony-Anhalt.

The suspect acted alone, and there was no ongoing threat to the public, he said. Officials have not given more information about a possible motive or cause of the crash.

The victims include one adult and one child, Haseloff said. He did not rule out additional deaths due to the severity of some of the injuries.

The suspect is 50 years old and entered Germany for the first time in 2006, according to Tamara Zieschang, interior minister of Saxony-Anhalt. He last worked as a doctor in Bernburg, about 30 miles south of Magdeburg, Zieschang said.

A short video of the incident posted on X and geolocated to Magdeburg shows a vehicle speeding through a crowd of shoppers, hitting dozens as others scramble to safety. The vehicle races straight before making a right turn out of view.

The man was driving a rental vehicle, Haseloff said.

The White House is closely monitoring the incident in Magdeburg and has offered support to German officials, extending condolences to the victims, their families and the German people, a White House official said.

In a similar incident almost exactly eight years ago, a driver plowed into a Christmas market in 2016 in Berlin, killing at least 12 people and injuring dozens more.

Police in New York City have increased security at holiday markets as a precaution and in response to the incident in Germany, a senior NYPD official told NBC News on Friday.

Additional resources will be sent to numerous holiday markets and high-profile locations across the city. Threats have been made to some markets abroad, but no specific local threat has been made, the official said.

The death toll in a car-ramming attack at a Christmas market in the German city of Magdeburg has risen to five people, and more than 200 have been injured, many of them seriously, state premier Reiner Haseloff said on Saturday.

The BBC reported that the Magdeburg Municipal Hospital's medical director said that over 80 people were treated yesterday.

"Some patients had to undergo emergency surgery, some are now in intensive care,” he said, as reported by the BBC.

Anti-Islam activist
The motive for the attack remains unclear, but the suspect's dissatisfaction with Germany's treatment of Saudi refugees may have played a role, the prosecutor in the central city of Magdeburg told a press conference following Friday's attack.

Germany's FAZ newspaper said it interviewed the suspect in 2019, describing him as an anti-Islam activist.

"People like me, who have an Islamic background but are no longer believers, are met with neither understanding nor tolerance by Muslims here," he was quoted as saying. "I am history's most aggressive critic of Islam. If you don't believe me, ask the Arabs."

German media has not yet named the suspect, and refers to him as Taleb A.

The suspect arrested in connection with a deadly car-ramming attack at a Christmas market in the German city of Magdeburg was Islamophobic, Interior Minister Nancy Faeser told reporters on Saturday.

"This was clear to see," Faeser said.

Germany's Christmas markets
Christmas markets have been eyed as potential target sites by terrorists in Germany for some time. Only two weeks ago, German authorities arrested an Iraqi national suspected of targeting a Christmas market.

Last year, Christmas markets in Germany and Austria were put on high alert for fears of a potential attack.

In 2016, a truck rammed into a Christmas market in Berlin killing 12 people and wounding 48.

International reactions
Saudi Arabia condemned the ramming attack, the Gulf country's foreign ministry said in a statement on Saturday.

Saudi Arabia's statement made no mention of the suspect, who is of Saudi origin.

US billionaire Elon Musk, set to join President-elect Donald Trump's administration as an outside adviser, called on German Chancellor Olaf Scholz to resign after the incident.

"Scholz should resign immediately," Musk posted on X, adding: "Incompetent fool."

Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa'ar condemned the incident and confirmed that he contacted German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock in a post on X/Twitter on Saturday.

"Shocking images from Magdeburg, Germany last night," he wrote. "Israel stands with the German people in their mourning and offers any assistance required."

US President Joe Biden said on Saturday his team has been "in close touch" with German officials following the attack.

Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni stated her "utmost solidarity with the German people," the BBC reported.

"It's not the first time this has happened - it's not the first time this has happened around Christmas," she told reporters. "This is an issue we have been dealing with for years. We must be careful about how we manage our policies, including how we ensure the safety of our citizens."

German authorities said they received tipoffs last year about the suspect in a car attack at a Christmas market in Magdeburg as more details emerged on Sunday about the five people killed.

Authorities say he does not fit the usual profile of perpetrators of extremist attacks. He described himself as an ex-Muslim who was highly critical of Islam and in many posts on social media expressed support for the far-right anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany (AfD) party.

"The man also published a huge number of posts on the internet. He also had contact with various authorities, made insults and even threats. However, he was not known to have committed acts of violence," said Münch, whose office is the German equivalent of the FBI.

He said that the warnings, however, proved to be very unspecific.

The Federal Office for Migration and Refugees also said Saturday on X that it received a tipoff about the suspect in the late summer of last year.

"This was taken seriously, like every other of the numerous tips," the office said. But it also noted that it is not an investigative authority and that it referred the information to the responsible authorities. It gave no other details.

The Central Council of Ex-Muslims said in a statement that the suspect had "terrorized" them for years as it expressed shock at the attack.

"He apparently shared beliefs from the far-right spectrum of the AfD and believed in a large-scale conspiracy aimed at Islamizing Germany. His delusional ideas went so far that he assumed that even organizations critical of Islamism were part of the Islamist conspiracy," said the statement.

The group's chairwoman, Mina Ahadi, said in the same statement: "At first we suspected that he might be a mole in the Islamist movement. But now I think he is a psychopath who adheres to ultra-right conspiracy ideologies."

Police in Magdeburg, the capital of the state of Saxony-Anhalt, said Sunday that those who died were four women aged 45, 52, 67 and 75, as well as a 9-year-old boy.

Authorities said 200 people were injured, including 41 in serious condition. They were being treated in multiple hospitals in Magdeburg, which is about 130 kilometers (80 miles) west of Berlin, and beyond.

The suspect was on Saturday evening brought before a judge, who behind closed doors ordered him to be kept in custody on allegations of murder and attempted murder. He is facing a possible indictment.

Are you suggesting that's incompatible with him being a far-right extremist?

I was pointing out that a person known to be a far right extremist was not profiled as a threat which I found odd for Germany because of their Nazi past. Apparently Muslims are considered a threat but not Islamophobes