The German media’s inability to put the “suspect in a mould” fuels xenophobia and shows the utter dehumanization of Muslims that exists within the German political framework, writes Hebh Jamal [photo credit: Getty Images]
On December 20, a horrific attack took place at a Christmas Market in Magdeburg, Germany, where five people were killed, and nearly 200 others injured after a man drove into the crowded event.
The tragedy sent shockwaves across the world, but even before the victims’ loved ones could begin to grieve, another story began to dominate the narrative: the false claim that Muslims and foreigners pose a fundamental threat to Germany and must be expelled.
Speculation about the attacker’s identity quickly spiralled into assumptions of radical Islamist motives targeting white Germans during the holiday season. One post on X declared, “Europe needs to wake up quickly and start mass deportation.” Another user shared a photo with the hashtag #Magdeburg, captioned, “Remigration. Europe is not your homeland. Stop the integration lie.”
Yet, the attacker, Taleb Al Abdulmohsen, was neither Muslim nor an Islamist. A Saudi national residing in Germany since 2006, Abdulmohsen was vocal in his disdain for both Islam and the Saudi government.
He expressed support for Israel, aligned himself with Germany’s far-right AfD party, and repeatedly criticised former Chancellor Angela Merkel’s decision to accept Syrian refugees. His social media was littered with far-right propaganda warning of “sharia law” and denouncing Islam.
Despite these clear contradictions, the facts seemed irrelevant to the Islamophobic frenzy that followed. Abdulmohsen’s identity as an Arab migrant was enough for him to be labelled an Islamist.
The damage was further amplified when X owner Elon Musk shared a video of a woman claiming that Abdulmohsen was secretly a radical Islamist.
She invoked the concept of “taqiyya” — a misunderstood Islamic term referring to dissimulation under duress — to argue that his public opposition to Islam was a deceptive ploy. This baseless conspiracy theory spread to Musk’s 209 million followers, reinforcing a false narrative that the attacker carried out his attack in the name of his faith.
Three days after the attack, AfD leader, Alice Weidel called for a rally in Magdeburg where speaks to a crowd of thousands that the attack was an “act by an Islamist full of hate for what brings people together” and that “too much focus is placed on relativising the actions of those who despise our society,” said Weidel.
Knowingly obscuring the facts, Weidel and the AfD have carefully manufactured rage against migrants and Muslims, weaponising the attacks in Magdeburg just in time for Germany’s upcoming elections.
For Germany’s political elite, Islamophobia is a natural reflex
As political factions in the government are trying to ease tensions and clamp down on misinformation, it is now far too late. For years, the more moderate political parties in Germany have appeased right-wing sentiments, clamped down on immigration and stoked fears against migrants in language that does not sound far different from the AfD itself.
Just last year, Olaf Sholz signed the biggest anti-immigration bill in the country’s history. The cross-party deal was to clamp down on immigration, cut back benefits from asylum seekers and refugees, aims to speed up deportations, and considers setting up migrant centers outside of the country.
This was a clear attempt to subdue the right-wing populist support and the rise of the AfD. It backfired, serving only to amplify xenophobic fears rather than quell them.
FDP and CDU politicians have even called for migrant quotes to be placed in neighbourhoods and schools.
FDP Vice President Wolfgang Kubicki said that a “quarter of the city must not have more than 25 percent migrants so that no parallel societies emerge” and referred to pro-Palestinian demonstrations that take place on German streets due to the “parallel societies that develop because people came together in certain neighbourhoods.” CDU General Linnemann echoes Kubicki by calling for a similar quota, but in schools.
Subscribe Now and Listen to our Podcasts OnEven calls for unity from figures like German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier ring hollow. While condemning “hatred and violence,” Steinmeier has previously demanded blanket condemnations of Hamas from Arabs and Palestinians in Germany, implicitly holding entire communities accountable for events abroad.
Even in her attempt to discredit Weidel, the German interior minister, Nancy Faeser links the attacker’s brutality to Muslims. Faeser told BILD, that the suspect “acted in an unbelievably cruel and brutal manner like an Islamist terrorist, although he was ideologically hostile to Islam.”
Faeser’s association of violence with Islam and her inability to put the “suspect in a mould” fuels xenophobia and shows the utter dehumanisation of Muslims that exists within the German political framework.
And for over a year, the political language around pro-Palestinian demonstrators who are protesting their government’s complicity in genocide, are called antisemites who are criminalised, censored, beaten by police, and even denied citizenship.
To the regular German, innocent people are now no different than the Magdeburg attacker, and the German political elite is entirely to blame for their refusal to condemn right-wing extremist rhetoric. Instead, they have been fueling it, and an anticipatory AfD victory can only mean dark days ahead for Muslims in the West.
Hebh Jamal is a Palestinian American journalist based in Germany.
Follow her on Twitter and Instagram: @hebh_jamal
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Opinions expressed in this article remain those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The New Arab, its editorial board or staff.