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A SYRIAN ASYLUM seeker who blew himself up outside a German music festival had made a video pledging allegiance to the so-called Islamic State group, making it the second attack claimed by the jihadists in Germany in a week.
The 27-year-old assailant wounded 15 people, four of them seriously, near a cafe in the southern city of Ansbach on Sunday night when he set off a bomb in his rucksack, killing himself.
“A video made by the assailant was found on his mobile phone in which he threatened an attack,” Bavarian state interior minister Joachim Herrmann told reporters.
After that he announced in the name of Allah that he pledged allegiance to (IS chief) Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the well-known Islamist leader, and announced an act of revenge against Germans because they were standing in the way of Islam.
IS later said via the jihadist-linked Amaq news agency that the attacker “was a soldier of the Islamic State” who had acted “in response to calls to target nations in the coalition fighting” the extremists.
Europe’s economic powerhouse was already reeling after four passengers and a passer-by were wounded in an axe attack on a train in Wuerzburg on 18 July which IS also claimed.
Then on Friday, nine people were killed in a shopping centre shooting spree in Munich by a German-Iranian teenager with a history of psychological problems but no apparent links to Islamists.
Already steeped in grief and shock, Germans were further rattled by news that a Syrian refugee had killed a 45-year-old Polish woman with a large kebab knife at a snack bar in the southwestern city of Reutlingen on Sunday.
Police, who had initially said the murder weapon was a machete, concluded that the incident in which three others were injured was likely a “crime of passion”.
Three of the four brutal incidents were in Bavaria, the southern state which has been a gateway for tens of thousands of refugees under Chancellor Angela Merkel’s liberal asylum policy.
Merkel’s deputy spokeswoman Ulrike Demmer expressed the government’s “shock” after the rash of attacks but also warned against branding all migrants a security threat.
“Most of the terrorists who carried out attacks in recent months in Europe were not refugees,” she told reporters.
The terrorism threat (among refugees) is not larger or smaller than in the population at large.
‘Friendly, inconspicuous’
Police said the Syrian man intended to target the open-air festival attended by 2,500 people but was turned away as he did not have a ticket, and detonated the device outside a nearby cafe.
“If he had made it inside, there would certainly have been more victims,” a police spokesman said.
The attacker, who came to Germany two years ago but had his asylum claim rejected after a year, had tried to kill himself twice in the past and had spent time in a psychiatric clinic.
He was facing imminent deportation to Bulgaria, where he was first registered within the European Union as an asylum seeker and which had granted his claim, a German interior ministry spokesman said.
The assailant, who lived in Ansbach, was already known to police, having been linked to a drug-related offence.
However a social worker who knew him, Reinhold Eschenbacher, described him as “friendly, inconspicuous and nice” when he came to his office pick up his welfare benefits, DPA news agency reported.
Stephan Mayer, a deputy from Merkel’s conservative bloc, said it was “completely wrong” to blame the government’s refugee policy for the spate of assaults.
But Mayer told the BBC that the 1.1 million migrants and refugees Germany let in last year represented a “big challenge” for law enforcement, even as the influx has dwindled in recent months.
“We were not able to register and control all the migrants that crossed the German border,” Mayer admitted.
The president of a German police union, Rainer Wendt, said the government needed to do more to determine whether individual migrants and refugees “represent a danger”.
“We are seeing at this time how fragile psychological states, terrorism and crime are mixing,” he warned.
Europe has been on edge for months after a string of deadly attacks claimed by IS, including bombings in Brussels and Paris and the carnage at Bastille Day celebrations in the southern French city of Nice.
Chilling precision
Meanwhile police released more details on Munich mall attacker David Ali Sonboly, saying the 18-year-old was depressed and had spent two months in a psychiatric unit last year.
The teen, who had both German and Iranian nationality, was obsessed with mass killings — including Norwegian rightwing fanatic Anders Behring Breivik’s 2011 massacre — and spent a year preparing for the shooting spree.
At least 35 people were also wounded during Sonboly’s attack, which began at a McDonald’s restaurant and ended with him turning his 9mm Glock pistol on himself.
Investigators have ruled out any link with IS jihadists, although he appeared to have planned the assault with chilling precision for a year.
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It’s not all about cuts. We are less family orientated and have less time to look after older relatives. Simple fact is that the day of taking an elderly parent in and looking after them to the end of their days is getting rarer. There were absolutely no supports years ago and it was far more common. The article takes the lazy route of blaming Government for everything and ignoring any sense of individual responsibility or individual choice. My grandmother looked after her aunt and mother till they died and my mother her mother. Not a carers grant in sight. I think we got a commode and a special bed from the HSE and that was it!
So Gavin How many elderly relations are you looking after.
As I’m unmarried and in ireland I’ll probably be looking after my widowed mother as it happens. Have you any reply other than a facetious one?
Probably ?
I think you are somewhat right Gavin, but there are a lot of other reasons why a lot of elderly people end up in nursing homes, lack of family members being one, work commitments can impede ones ability to provide sufficient care, also the nature of the illness or ailment the elderly relative may be suffering from and the relatives ability to provide a sufficient level of care in that instance. I cared for my mam last year when she was diagnosed with inoperable pancreatic cancer, as she needed round the clock care she came to live with us, I am fortunate enough to own my own business so could rearrange my work commitments, it was intensely tough going but I do not regret one minute of it. The carers allowance takes on average 6 months to process and even if I had applied by the time it would have been received mam had died.
@ molly coddled, 100% agree with you also sorry for the loss of your mum.
Gavin you have taken the bait like so many others, we have been led into the debt trap by our capital pupit masters. It now takes two working to maintain our modern debt dependent lifestyles which dosent allow for stay at home carers
Gavin. There are situations when it is just unsafe and irrisponsible to keep an elderly person in their own home. Particularly with mid/late stage dementia. Sometimes a family will think they’re doing the right thing but in fact are doing more damage as they are not qualified or skilled to deal with a person with this illness 24 hours a day 7 days a week. Dementia sufferers will often wander or get up in the middle of the night to put the kettle on. I have seen a person with dementia trying to drink tea directly from a tea pot as they were confused. Can you imagine what would have happened if that wasn’t caught in time. Also the time spent visiting a person can be better quality time. No matter who you are. If you have to look after somebody on your own 24/7 you will begin to resent it.
As a carer for my Great aunt and Grandmother who both have Alzheimers and need 24/7 care, I can see exactly why people would chose to residential care. It is a horrendously hard job. Besides that though it takes an insane amount of time to get supports in place. One has a catheter bag. it took a couple of years for that to happen. Her skin was in shreds from being constantly wet no matter how often her pad was changed.The other has only recently become incontinent and it took nearly 6 months of washing urine and faeces out of bed sheets and clothes and even furniture and the floor for the pads to arrive. Cash cow!! As IF. The cost and strain on the family is immense. Someone has to be here 24/7 in case one of them has an accident or tries to wonder off. I gave up my career and moved home to make life easier on my parents. We are saving the government thousands by keeping them at home and we cant even go on a family holiday for a week. Respite has be cut to shreds. You get it once every 4 months approx., for 4 days. not even 4 full days. On the Monday you bring them in before lunch so maybe 11/12 then on the Friday you have to collect them by 4pm or else an ambulance is called and they are sent up to Loughlinstown hospital. A contract has to be signed to that effect. My 3 younger siblings are still in education on top of everything. My mother is an only child so it falls down to us to make sure that my Granny and my Aunt live the remainder of their lives in what comfort we can provide them. Family friends dont visit like they used to because my aunt gets so agitated that she screams when anything is different. So tell me again why people would choose nursing home care instead?
Neither of them ever owned a house by the way. Cash cows. How god damned insulting.
Because we all want to sell granny’s tiny little bedsit that’s lucky to be located in the city centre that’s worth mega money so we can divide up the cash and party..!
Because they are cash cows and we steadily losing touch with values that were linked to the human spirit. No values no spirit. Well selfies and self gratification are on the rise that’s good though.
the old woman next door from me should be in a home she suffers from dementia and her family just leave her there she takes her car out regularly a d it always comes back with damage. it’s only a matter of time till she kills someone. she is 93 and will die in there alone surly a home is the best option
Sounds like her family should be In a him too. Government policy is to force old people into the lucrative homes a few owned by their buddies. As for my point about values it is about setting them and normalising the right to old age with dignity. It is self preservation because as far as I know the human physiology still suggests ae will all grow old eventually I dread to think how we will be treated if the mean spirited society continues. You made a valid point there but the bigger picture needs to be looked at.
Try getting a home care package for an elderly relative. It’s a nightmare. Our case was considered urgent yet I had to get reviews three times to finally get the help we needed for my father. It’s helps a great deal but I am still on call for everything and with my own disabled teenager to care for its still overwhelming sometimes. Sometimes elderly people just require too high a level of care for relatives. Having spent the weekend in hospital after my father had yet another fall and trying to juggle care for my son at home I feel I am at my limit to.be honest.
Kids just want their houses.
You obviously don’t know how much nursing homes cost.
Jason nursing home cost is over 4000 per month, under the HSE’s fair deal scheme when the money saved runs out the HSE picks up the tab for however long the person remains in the nursing home, however, in the event of the patient passing the house and assets have to be sold so as the HSE can recoup the costs. Usually nothing is left.
Cost of nursing home 80% of disposable income ie pension and 7.5% of assets per year over €36,000 charge on family home for 3 years only. Family still left with 78%.
One reason that the elderly sometimes need nursing home care is that there is the element of distance. An elderly person may want to stay where familiar friends can visit. The children may well be living in a different part of the country. This sometimes causes the last resort to become the first resort. Medical necessity should be the first criterion to be used when a decision in favour of nursing home care is taken. The home care element should be properly resourced particularly where an elderly person is living alone, although some elderly might find this intrusive.
More and more so different generations live in countries or cities other than their elderly parents and also working longer hours.
I’m sure you were all well able to take care of your parents, living around the corner and clocking off from your civil service job at 5pm everyday.
Unfortunately that’s no longer reflective of reality for a family who’s 4 kids live on different continents.
Taxing Family Homes (LPT) is forcing elderly out of their homes. This tax is a regressive 12th century serf law tax and should be abolished like inheritance taxes are beginning to be across Europe. 12th Century Serf Laws are not acceptable in any modern Democracy.
Political Parties are just private clubs, financial predators who max citizens taxes. Bring your brains to the polling booths if you want to stay in your Family homes when you retire.
Because the kids are scared of her moustache and I want to put a snooker table in her room.
Because we need to recycle to homes for a new generation
She never does
Because low life scmbags have to put them somewhere before they take their house, red thumb all you like, it won’t make it any less true.
Why are we ? How about some people instead .
ALSO ANOTHER QUESTION IS WHY DID THEY PAY TAX ALL THEIR LIFE FOR?
As well as what is the mass medication used in some of these homes to sedate these inmates???
have your say