MUNICH, Germany: German police shot useless an 18-year-old Austrian gunman in Munich on Thursday (Sep 5) in an alternate of fireside near the Israeli consulate, prompting politicians to emphasize the significance of defending Israeli websites within the nation.
Police stated the person, an Austrian nationwide, fired photographs from an outdated carbine rifle with a bayonet in Munich’s Maxvorstadt district, close to the consulate and a Nazi historical past museum, earlier than being killed in a shootout with 5 officers.
The incident occurred on the anniversary of the 1972 assault on the Munich Olympics during which Palestinian militants murdered 11 Israeli athletes. “There could also be a connection between the 2,” Bavarian state Premier Markus Soeder advised reporters, including that this was being investigated.
{The teenager} was already identified to Austrian authorities as a suspected extremist and had been reported to police final yr for alleged membership in an extremist group, a spokesperson for the Inside Ministry in Vienna stated.
A Munich police spokesperson stated {the teenager} was an Austrian citizen regarded as resident in Austria, with out giving additional particulars. He had just lately travelled to Germany and lived in Austria’s Salzburg space, Austria’s Normal newspaper and Germany’s Spiegel information outlet reported.
The Israeli overseas ministry stated its Munich consulate was closed on Thursday for a commemoration of the 1972 Olympics bloodbath and nobody from the consulate employees was injured in Thursday’s incident.
The museum and analysis institute focuses on the historical past of Germany’s 1933-45 Nazi regime.
German Inside Minister Nancy Faeser described the alternate of fireside as a severe incident. “The safety of Israeli services has prime precedence,” she stated.
“We do not know all of the background but. What we do know leaves us in shock,” stated Josef Schuster, head of Germany’s Central Council for Jews.
The capturing got here at a time of heightened polarisation in Germany’s political local weather. On Sunday, the anti-immigrant Different for Germany (AfD) turned the first far-right social gathering to win a regional election since World Struggle Two.
Politicians are additionally debating how one can stop violent crime following a spate of assaults, most just lately within the northwestern metropolis of Solingen the place three folks have been fatally stabbed by a Syrian asylum seeker at a competition final month.
Israeli President Isaac Herzog stated he had spoken to his German counterpart in regards to the incident in Munich.
“We expressed our shared condemnation and horror on the terror assault this morning,” Herzog posted on X, including that on the day of remembrance for the Olympics bloodbath, “a hate-fuelled terrorist got here and as soon as once more sought to homicide harmless folks”.
In October 2019, a gunman who had denounced Jews opened fireplace outdoors a German synagogue within the japanese metropolis of Halle on Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish yr, killing two folks.
