Solingen: Scholz expected at the scene of the attack that shook Germany

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz is traveling to Solingen on Monday, the scene of the knife attack for which he was ;é; arrested a Syrian, suspected of links with the Islamic State (IS) organization, relaunching the debate on migration policy in the country.

Friday night's attack, which left three dead and eight injured during local festivities, is increasing pressure on the head of government a week before high-stakes regional elections in two eastern German states.

After a day on the run, a 26-year-old Syrian man turned himself in to authorities on Saturday night and said, according to police, “he was responsible” for the crime.

IS claimed responsibility for the act and said the attacker had acted “to avenge the Muslims of Palestine and everywhere else,” according to a statement from the jihadist group sent via its propaganda outlet Amaq.

The suspect wanted to “kill as many people as possible,” said the federal prosecutor's office in Karlsruhe, which reported “strong suspicions of affiliation” on Sunday. to the jihadist organization Islamic State.

Elite police officers take away a man suspected of being the author of the Solingen knife attack, Germany, on August 25, 2024 in Karlsruhe, southern Germany © AFP – THOMAS KIENZLE

“He stabbed festival visitors several times and in a targeted manner, in the back, neck and torso,” described the parquet.

The suspect, designated by the courts as Issa Al H., arrived in the country in December 2022, according to several German media outlets, and was subject to an expulsion measure to Bulgaria, a European Union state where his entry had been registered and where he should have filed his asylum application, under EU rules.

– “Chaos” –

According to German Vice Chancellor Robert Habeck, he was not on the lists of Islamist extremists considered dangerous.

In recent years, Germany has been the scene of several jihadist attacks, the deadliest of which, a truck attack in December 2016 on a Christmas market in Berlin, killed 12 dead.

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Tributes to the victims of the Solingen knife attack, August 24, 2024 © AFP – INA FASSBENDER

Olaf Scholz is to pay tribute to the victims of the Solingen attack this morning. Near the scene of the tragedy, bouquets of flowers, candles and messages bear witness to the emotion that has gripped the town of some 160,000 inhabitants.

Two men aged 56 and 67 and a 56-year-old woman were killed among thousands of spectators attending a concert.

The Solingen festival was due to celebrate the 650th anniversary of the city in North Rhine-Westphalia, not far from Düsseldorf and Cologne, over three days.

The attack has rekindled the debate on migration and public security policy.

The far-right AfD party, which is well placed to obtain an unprecedented score in regional elections next weekend in two former GDR states, Saxony and Thuringia, has accused successive governments of having caused “chaos” by welcoming too many of immigrants.

The party called for “an offensive on expulsions.”

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz (left) and the leader of the conservative opposition CDU Friedrich Merz, on June 26, 2024 at the Bundestag in Berlin © AFP – RALF HIRSCHBERGER

Friedrich Merz, the leader of the conservative CDU, the main opposition party, urged the government to “no longer accept refugees” from “Syria and of Afghanistan”.

Olaf Scholz's coalition had already been under pressure for several weeks to resume deportations of criminals to Afghanistan and Syria, two countries for which Germany had declared a moratorium due to the internal political situation.

The main leaders of the Social Democrats and the Greens had been in favour of tougher deportation rules since the knife attack by a 25-year-old Afghan in Mannheim (west) at the end of May. The attack targeting an anti-Islam rally and suspected of having an Islamist motivation cost the life of a police officer and left five others injured.

Police officers stand guard after the knife attack in Solingen, on August 23, 2024 in western Germany © AFP – INA FASSBENDER

The Vice Chancellor Habeck proposed on Sunday to tighten gun laws: “Nobody in Germany needs bladed weapons in public spaces. We are not in the Middle Ages.”

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