A 30-year-old Iraqi-born man drove his car into several motorcycles on a Berlin motorway on Tuesday night, injuring six people, in what German authorities said was an Islamist-inspired terrorist attack, according to reports.
“Given the current state of our investigation, we assume this was an Islamist-motivated attack,” said Berlin interior senator Andreas Geisel. “A religiously motivated background cannot be ruled out.”
Three of the victims suffered serious injuries, with at least one of them in life-threatening condition, officials said.
One of the three was a firefighter who went home from work, Geisel said. It was unclear if he was the one who is in life-threatening condition.
The suspect – identified by local media only as Samrad D. – is being investigated for three counts of attempted murder after he allegedly rummaged around the cars at three different locations
He was riding in a black Opel Astra, which he stopped on the road after the third accident and put an old ammunition box on the roof, claiming it had explosives inside, officials said.
Several media outlets reported that he “Allahu akbar!” – “God is great!” – when he got out of his car. De Bild reported daily that he also wrote: “No one comes closer, or you will all die.”
The man then rolled out a prayer rug and began praying, the daily Tagesspiegel reported.
An Arabic-speaking cop approached the suspect, who is known to Berlin police, and spoke to him before arresting him, according to the outlet.
The German news agency DPA reported that he apparently made references to his plans on Facebook for the attack, and posted pictures of the car, as well as religious writings.
The suspect was born in Baghdad in 1990 and lived in a refugee residence in Berlin. In 2018, he was arrested for injuring people and after a short period taken to a mental institution, Tagesspiegel reported.
There were indications that the suspect had problems with mental health.
“The fact that the suspect may have been suffering from psychological problems does not make this problem any easier,” Geisel said. “When personal issues mix with religiously charged ideas, this can lead to uncontrollable actions – yesterday’s events have shown in a very painful way how vulnerable our society is.”
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