Attack near the Eiffel Tower: German dies in knife attack in Paris
According to Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin, the attack began on Saturday evening at around 9 p.m. near the Eiffel Tower. The 26-year-old perpetrator first attacked the 23-year-old German and his partner with a knife and stabbed the man. Thanks to the courageous intervention of a cab driver, his companion was unharmed.
The young man who was killed had both German and Filipino citizenship. The French emergency doctor Patrick Pelloux reported that his companion was in severe shock.
According to Darmanin, the perpetrator fled to the other side of the Seine and attacked two other people there with a hammer. A 60-year-old Frenchman was injured and a 66-year-old British tourist suffered a shock. Shortly afterwards, the attacker was overpowered by the police with the help of a Taser. He is said to have shouted "Allahu Akbar" (God is great) during the attack, reported the Home Secretary.
An eyewitness, who was in a bar nearby during the attack, described hearing cries for help and seeing people running away. A man "with a hammer in his hand" attacked a passer-by, who then fell. After "five to ten minutes", the police arrived.
According to Darmanin, the attacker was already known to be an Islamist: He was accordingly sentenced to five years in prison in 2016 for planning another attack in the La Défense business district of Paris, of which he served four years. He then remained under judicial supervision.
According to the investigators, the 26-year-old was born in France to Iranian parents and had French citizenship. He last lived with his parents in the Paris area. According to investigators, the man had suffered from psychological problems. He was "very unstable" and "easily influenced" and had received psychiatric treatment during and after his detention. The details of his treatment are now being investigated further.
After his arrest, the assassin stated that he could no longer bear to see Muslims killed in "Afghanistan and Palestine". He accused France of being Israel's "accomplice" in the Gaza war. At around the same time as his attack, the 26-year-old also published a video on online networks in which he referred to "the current situation, the government, the murder of innocent Muslims".
Federal Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock (Greens) expressed her shock at the fatal knife attack on the young German. Her thoughts are with the young man's friends and family and she wishes the injured a speedy recovery, she said on the online service X (formerly Twitter). She added: "Hate and terror have no place in Europe."
French President Emmanuel Macron expressed his "condolences" to the relatives of the victim on the online service X. Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne declared on X: "We will not give in to terrorism." Macron called on Borne to convene a security meeting on Sunday afternoon.
Since the major attack by the radical Islamic group Hamas on Israel on October 7 and the subsequent massive Israeli shelling of targets in the Gaza Strip, tensions have increased massively in France, which has a large Jewish and Muslim population.
The highest attack alert level is in force in France after a radicalized ex-pupil stabbed a 57-year-old teacher and injured three other staff members at a school in Arras in northern France on 13 October.
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Source: www.stern.de
