Taleb al-Abdulmohsen, a self-described member of the liberal opposition to Saudi Arabia who has expressed strong anti-Islamic and anti-immigration beliefs, has been named as the suspect in the German car-ramming assault that killed five people and injured over 200 others on Friday.
Al-Abdulmohsen was named as the suspect by two high-ranking authorities with knowledge of the case.
Shoppers congregated in a tiny alley in Magdeburg, a city of roughly 240,000 people west of Berlin, on Friday night when the automobile purportedly driven by al-Abdulmohsen crashed 1,200 feet into the crowd. A 9-year-old youngster and four adults are among the victims.
Al-Abdulmohsen, a Saudi Arabian physician who resided in Germany, applied for asylum in Germany in 2016 after receiving threats from Saudi Arabia. He later worked as a psychiatry expert at a clinic. However, an NGO for refugees has accused him of unpredictable behavior, and his internet activity contains both historical and contemporary provocative content on X. He has praised individuals like Dutch far-right leader Geert Wilders and allied himself with far-right movements like Germany’s anti-immigration Alternative for Germany (AfD) party.
Although police have not yet disclosed a motive for the attack on the Christmas market, two top officials informed NBC News that they are looking into whether the incident is connected to terrorism. According to the top officials, German prosecutors have stated that they now intend to file accusations of homicide and attempted homicide in addition to counts of severe assault.
Germany wants to Islamize Europe, according to the bio on Al-Abdulmohsen’s X account, which NBC News confirmed.
In November, he retweeted a post asserting that Islam is not a religion, and in December, he reposted an X event titled Islam an international problem. He also retweeted Alice Weidel, co-chairwoman of the far-right Alternative for Germany, in the same month. Weidel blamed former Chancellor Angela Merkel for unchecked mass immigration, which she said was seriously harming Germany.
Al-Abdulmohsen referred to Geert Wilders, the head of the Dutch anti-immigrant Party for Freedom, as a real hero on X in November. For calling Moroccans filth and drawing a comparison between the Quran and Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf, Wilders has come under fire for being Islamophobic.
Because of the current investigation, the German police chose not to comment on al-Abdulmohsen’s X account.
Al-Abdulmohsen claimed to have abandoned Islam in his early twenties after feigning to be a Muslim in an interview with the newspaper FAZ in 2019. He clarified that he solely intended to oppose Islam when he registered on Twitter.
In an email to NBC News, the Bernburg psychiatric hospital’s Salus clinic acknowledged that the suspect was once employed by the facility as a psychiatry specialist and had been absent since the end of October due to illness and vacation.
The non-governmental organization Aid for Secular Refugees said on Saturday that after al-Abdulmohsen’s vilest verbal abuse and slander in 2019, members of Secular Refugee Aid filed a police complaint, saying it could not find any justification for his aggressive accusations and defamation campaign.
Al-Abdulmohsen also shared a video in which he criticized the German government for allegedly stifling free expression and permitting the mistreatment of Saudi immigrants by using an AI avatar of Elon Musk.
Last week, he repeated the tech billionaire’s statement on X that only the AfD can save Germany, expressing his support for the party.
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