A 27-year-old German is the suspect of a deadly attack on a synagogue in the city of Halle, according to news magazines Spiegel and Focus Online.
Two people were gunned down and two more were injured by a gunman on Wednesday. While the police have detained one person, the gunman is believed to still be at large. The victims have been identified as a man and a woman.
The suspect fled the scene in a vehicle and is believed to have been wearing military gear. The police have warned the residents of Halle to stay indoors.
The attacker attempted to break open the doors to the synagogue, but also opened fire at a nearby Turkish-kebab shop. Another shooting was reported in a town ten miles (16 km) away.
According to a director of the International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation and Political Violence (ICSR), the gunman broadcast the shootings on livestreaming platform Twitch, where he also expressed his manifesto in a style similar to that seen during the New Zealand Christchurch shootings.
Shiraz Maher, of ICSR, tweeted that the attacker identified as ‘Anon’ and that he believed that the holocaust never happened. The attacker went on to blame feminism for the cause of declining birth rates, as well as the Jewish people. He reportedly referred to himself as a loser, multiple times during the stream.
Anon, short for anonymous, is a popular term used to address users on forums like 4chan and 8chan.
For officials, so far, the shooting, which took place during the Jewish holy day of Yom Kippur, is believed to have been anti-semitic by nature, according to German Interior Minister Horst Seehofer.
Seehofer said in a statement, “Based on current information, we have to assume that it was at least an anti-Semitic attack. According to the federal prosecutor’s office, there are enough indications that it was possibly a right-wing extremist motive. They have taken over the investigations.”
