The preparations for the event called for this Friday by the Islamophobic association Pax Europa in the city center of Mannheim, in western Germany, have ended in tragedy. Around 11 in the morning, a man violently attacked with a knife and injured six people, including a police officer who was trying to help one of those attacked, before being killed by another police officer.
The incident took place around the information stand that the association, based in Krefeld (State of North Rhine-Westphalia) and which warns against what it calls the Islamization of Europe and “political Islam”, had set up in the square. from the market of this city, where about 300,000 people live. Michael Stürzenberger, one of the country’s most critical voices against Islam and considered an extremist by the German intelligence services, was scheduled to speak there at noon. He has been injured in the face and leg, according to The organization has reported on its website.
The extent and severity of the injuries is still unknown, and they have been transferred to different hospitals in the city. Some, like the police officer, have had to undergo emergency surgery. According to the German public broadcaster SWR, the attacker – who apparently only had his mobile phone on him and whose identity is still unknown – walked around the Pax Europa booth several times in the minutes before the attack, presumably to evaluate his chances of escape. Act.
The Karlsruhe Public Prosecutor’s Office, the Mannheim Police Headquarters and the Anti-Crime Office (LKA) have confirmed the number of injured: six plus the attacker. The rest are five members of Pax Europa and a police officer who intervened in the incident to remove one of those stabbed from the danger zone and who was “stabbed several times in the back of the head.” Another agent prevented the attack from continuing by shooting at the attacker and wounding him, they have indicated. The LKA has taken over the investigation in cooperation with the Mannheim Police Headquarters under the direction of the State Security Department of the Karlsruhe Prosecutor’s Office. A spokesman for the security forces has indicated to the German network SWR that it will be investigated whether the event had a political background.
A video published by a user on the social network It would be Stürzenberger. Next, you can see how the aggressor, surrounded by several citizens, stabs a police officer and wounds him in the back of the head and neck. Finally, the attacker is neutralized by another agent’s shot. In the video you can see several police officers with service weapons in their hands.
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![The suspect in the attack, carrying a knife.](https://imagenes.elpais.com/resizer/v2/35PM33BQ3BBOFMCEHZNYRQF75Q.jpg?auth=b7a5aed867020af896fcbba67115b8923d39ad45ed63a3efcb8ce0b76014eec1&width=414)
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has described the images as “terrible” through the social network. “My thoughts are with the victims. Violence is absolutely unacceptable in our democracy. The aggressor must be severely punished.” The mayor of Mannheim, Christian Specht, has also expressed his shock: “This brutal attack shocks and shakes us, it leaves us speechless.” Likewise, he has warned that we should not speculate about the background of the crime, but rather wait for the results of the investigation.
For her part, Germany’s Interior Minister, Nancy Faeser, has said that this is “a terrible crime.” “The images of the attack are shocking. I wish the victims a full recovery. “My thoughts are also with the seriously injured police officer,” has published in X. “The investigation will shed light on the background of this crime. If the investigation reveals an Islamist motive, it would be further confirmation of the great danger posed by acts of Islamist violence, about which we have warned, ”he adds in his message.
A radicalized anti-Islamist
Michael Stürzenberger, 59, began his activism in the Christian Social Union (CSU), the conservative party of Bavaria, where he worked as a press spokesperson between 2003 and 2004, but an event that occurred later and which he himself described as a key moment in His life led him to become radicalized: in 2008, a friend of his and party colleague, Ralph Burkei, died in the Islamist terrorist attacks in Bombay, India. After that, Stürzenberger left the CSU and joined the La Libertad party, founded in 2010 and classified as an Islamophobic group by the German intelligence services. In 2013 he was elected president of the party and that year he also stood as the main candidate in the Bavarian elections. His party only achieved 0.1% of the vote. After the elections, this group ceased its activities, until its dissolution in 2016.
Stürzenberger has been making public appearances with anti-Islamic theses for many years and touring the country as a member of the Pax Europa citizen movement. He was also one of the co-organizers of the Munich branch of Pegida (European Patriots against the Islamization of the West). He accuses German politicians of not taking seriously the dangers posed by Islam and compares the Koran to the book Mein Kampf (My Struggle) by Adolf Hitler.
The Bavarian Office for the Protection of the Constitution – the German secret services in the interior – has been monitoring Stürzenberger since 2013 for carrying out “Islamophobic activities” with the aim of “abolishing the religious freedom of Muslims” and for “considering Muslims second class people.” Likewise, they warn that he does not distinguish between Islam as a religion and Islam as an extremist movement. In the 2022 report, they classified both Stürzenberger and Pax Europa as “Islamophobes relevant to the protection of the Constitution.” However, in the latest report from 2023 they no longer appeared, although according to the authorities this was only because they are less active, but they are still being monitored.
Stürzenberger is also very active on social media and is the author of the xenophobic, racist and Islamophobic website PI News (Politically Incorrect), which describes itself as having a “pro-Israel” and “pro-American” stance and which is rated by the services German intelligence agencies as “an extremist company in the field of the phenomenon of right-wing extremism.”
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