Suspect in German Christmas market attack had history of troubling social media posts that grew increasingly dark
December 22, 2024
The man accused of killing five people and injuring more than 200 others by ramming a car into a crowded German Christmas market had a history of making anti-Islam statements, which had grown increasingly dark and threatening towards Germany in recent months.
The suspect, Taleb Al Abdulmohsen, was arrested at the scene of the deadly attack in Magdenburg on Friday. German authorities said they believe he acted alone.
A Saudi Arabian citizen, the 50-year-old psychiatrist came to Germany in 2006. Once settled in the country, he began sharing advice online with other people about how to escape repressive regimes in Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states, setting up the platform wearesaudis.net.
While initially appreciative of Germany, in recent years he appeared to grow increasingly disgruntled with the country and its immigration policies. In 2015, Germany welcomed more than a million refugees from the Middle East but has since moved to tighten border controls.
German authorities said on Saturday that they were examining Al Abdulmohsen’s “dissatisfaction” with Germany’s treatment of refugees, although they said more time was needed to establish a motive.
On social media, Al Abdulmohsen posted openly about renouncing his Islamic faith, expressed sympathy for the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party and accused Germany of promoting the Islamization of the country.
Earlier this year, he made dark threats against Germany and the German people online – something the German authorities were apparently alerted to. On his account on X, formerly Twitter, he posted in May to his nearly 50,000 followers: “German terrorism will be brought to justice. It’s very likely that I will die this year in order to bring justice.”
He made a similar statement in August, when he posted: “I assure you that if Germany wants a war, we will fight it. If Germany wants to kill us, we will slaughter them, die, or go to prison with pride.”
As part of efforts to promote his activism work, Al Abdulmohsen had been in touch with many media organizations, including CNN. He told news outlets he had regular contact with vulnerable women and would often be their only point of contact outside Saudi Arabia. He said he helped them plan travel to visa-free countries, and, on several occasions, he facilitated contact between these women and the media.
CNN communicated with him when reporting a story about two women who had fled Saudi Arabia for the former Soviet state of Georgia that was published in 2019. He helped facilitate contact with the women, although he was not interviewed for the piece.
The BBC interviewed him about his activism in 2019. He told the broadcaster he left Saudi Arabia after his life was threatened there. He said he spent up to “10 to 16 hours a day helping” Saudi asylum seekers and added that 90% of people contacting him were women. He also gave interviews to German media about his work.
His contact with CNN subsided around the time of the Covid-19 pandemic. However, Al Abdulmohsen began reaching out again early this year, sending a barrage of aggressive messages to the CNN journalist with whom he was previously in touch, which contained unsubstantiated stories and claims related to his advocacy work.
CNN ceased direct communication with him, blocking notifications from him on WhatsApp and X. Subsequent messages from Al Abdulmohsen sent on X, including direct threats against the German people that were similar to those he made publicly, were not seen by CNN until after the attack.
CNN has reached out to the police and public prosecutor’s office in Magdeburg for comment on whether Al Abdulmohsen was known to mental health services or other relevant agencies before the attack. The police declined to comment due to the ongoing investigation.
Authorities said that Al Abdulmohsen worked as a psychiatrist in Bernburg, a small town about 25 miles south of Magdeburg. The clinic that employed Al Abdulmohsen said he had been a psychiatric specialist at a correctional facility for criminals with addictions in Bernburg since March 2020, but added he had not been to work since October 2024 due to vacation and illness.
Al Abdulmohsen appeared particularly frustrated with Atheist Refugee Relief, a German NGO that was supporting women who escaped Saudi Arabia and other oppressive regimes while they awaited the results of their asylum claims. Messages sent by Al Abdulmohsen to CNN suggest he believed the group was disrupting his efforts and accused them, among other charges, of questioning whether he had instructed the women to say they had renounced Islam while claiming asylum.
He made some of the allegations against the group publicly on social media, which led to Atheist Refugee Relief making a formal complaint with the police in 2019. According to a statement published by the group on Saturday, Al Abdulmohsen was eventually ordered by the Cologne Regional Court to delete the defamatory and accusatory posts. The case is currently going through the appeals process.
Questions had also been raised about Al Abdulmohsen’s practice of publicizing the cases of some of the Saudi escapees despite the risks they would face if their asylum applications were rejected, and they had to return to Saudi Arabia.
The German Office for Migration and Refugees said Saturday it received a tipoff about him via social media. “This was taken seriously, as were all the other numerous tips,” the office said in a statement on X. “The person providing the information was referred directly to the responsible authorities, as is usual in such cases,” it said.
The warnings went well beyond social media statements.
Saudi authorities had warned their German counterparts about Al Abdulmohsen on several occasions, two sources with knowledge of the communications told CNN on Saturday.
The first warning came in 2007 and was connected to concerns held by Saudi authorities that Al Abdulmohsen had expressed radical views of varying kinds, one of the sources said.
Saudi Arabia considers the suspect a fugitive and requested his extradition from Germany between 2007 and 2008, the source said, adding that German authorities refused, citing concerns for the man’s safety should he return.
A second source told CNN the Saudis alerted Germany to the individual in four official notifications. Three of the notifications, known as “Notes Verbal,” were sent to the German intelligence services and one to the country’s foreign ministry. The source said all of the warnings were ignored.
CNN reached out to the German Foreign Ministry for comment about the warnings and was referred to the Ministry of Interior, which in turn referred CNN to the public prosecutor’s office in Magdeburg. CNN has not received a response from the prosecutor’s office.
Speaking to the German public broadcaster ZDF on Saturday, the president of the German Federal Office of Criminal Investigation Holger Münch confirmed that a tipoff from Saudi Arabia was received by his office and that “proceedings were initiated.”
Münch said the police in Saxony-Anhalt, where Magdenburg is the capital, then began investigating, but added the threats were too unspecific.
“The man also published a huge number of posts on the internet. He also had various contacts with the authorities, insults and threats. But he was not known for violent acts,” he told ZDF, adding that the case will need to be looked at again “to check again whether we, as security authorities, have let something slip.”
Münch said the action of the suspect appeared to follow “a completely atypical pattern” – something some experts have also pointed out.
“After 25 years in this ‘business’ you think nothing could surprise you anymore. But a 50-year-old Saudi ex-Muslim who lives in East Germany, loves the AfD and wants to punish Germany for its tolerance towards Islamists — that really wasn’t on my radar,” Peter Neumann, professor of security studies at King’s College London, wrote on X.
The German Interior Minister Nancy Faeser on Saturday described Al Abdulmohsen as “an Islamophobe,” but gave few other details and said the investigation was just starting.
A 9-year-old boy and four women, aged 45, 52, 67 and 75, died in the attack, police said in a statement on Sunday. Authorities are holding Al Abdulmohsen in pre-trial detention on five counts of murder, several counts of attempted murder and several counts of dangerous bodily harm.
