Who is Magdeburg suspect Taleb al-Abdulmohsen? The dark history behind the Saudi doctor at the centre of the German Christmas attack
The softly spoken psychiatrist was unfailingly polite in his brief exchanges with his neighbours. One called him 'reserved but upright'.
Others assumed he was a decent sort too. Why else was he quoted in the liberal media as a humanitarian 'activist' who spoke out in support of female Saudi refugees fleeing oppression? But little about Dr Taleb Al-Abdulmohsen, 50, was quite as it seemed.
Alone in his ground-floor flat in the medieval German town of Bernburg, his patina of respectability soon faded along with his ready smile.
There, behind tightly drawn blinds, he worked long into the night on his computer, his 'kaleidoscope of paranoiac views' finding disturbing expression online.
Some of his tweets were incendiary and, with Germany struggling to make sense of Friday's slaughter in Magdeburg, terrifyingly prophetic.
'If Germany wants war, we will have it,' he posted in August. 'If Germany wants to kill us, we will slaughter them, die or proudly go to prison… Germany will pay the price.'
Dr Al-Abdulmohsen seemed to uncover conspiracy at every turn. The police were out to get him, he raged. Kill him, even. Though quite why was never exactly clear.
Taleb A
Taleb A, the car-ramming perpetrator that killed 5 and injured more than 200 in an attack on a Christmas market in Magdeburg, eastern Germany
Police officers secure the area during the German Chancellor's visit to the scene of a vehicle-ramming attack on the Christmas market in Magdeburg
Oblivious to all this, the neighbours in his apartment block were heartened by his professional status. However, some of his work colleagues at the Salus-Fachklinikum psychiatric facility thought otherwise.
According to court records, he 'viciously attacked' a colleague in 2018 but, strangely, the incident did not result in his dismissal.
And as the years passed and he grew increasingly angry with the German government and legal system, he continued to post vague but violent threats online.
Those in Germany's Saudi community viewed him as 'erratic'. One said there was 'something wrong with his mind'. Someone else called him a 'pariah'.
What eventually tipped this man of contradictions over the edge isn't exactly clear, at least not yet. Just as little is known about his personal life. None of his neighbours had ever seen him with a partner 'or in the company of anyone'.
But what is evident is that his catastrophic date with destiny was a long time coming – and that there were plenty of warnings along the way.
The perpetrator was an Islamist terrorist. The clues were obvious: the Christian target, the familiar attack method. We had been here before. Not just in Germany – where, in 2016, a Tunisian man with links to the Islamic State (ISIS) group, drove a truck into crowds gathered at a church market in Berlin – but also in Nice and London.
That the suspect turned out to be from Saudi Arabia only served to confirm the theory.
Plush toys, candles and floral tributes lie near the site where a car drove into a crowd at a Magdeburg Christmas market
Mourners lit candles and placed flowers outside a church near the market on the cold and gloomy day
Debris and empty stalls are seen on a closed Christmas market one day after a car-ramming attack in Magdeburg
In a five-minute audio message posted shortly before the Magdeburg attack, he said he held the German nation responsible for crimes including the killing of Socrates in 399 BC.
He also accused the authorities of stealing a USB stick from his post box and said he held 'the Germans responsible for what I am facing'.
Threatened with deportation in 2015, Dr Al-Abdulmohsen claimed he was now an ex-Muslim and an atheist and convinced officials that if he was sent back to Saudi Arabia he would be executed for apostasy.
He set up an Arabic internet forum called wearesaudis.net, giving practical advice to the country's dissidents, particularly, women, on how to claim asylum in Western countries.
The fake-dissident doctor helped dozens of Saudi women reach the West. But there were concerns over his obsessive behaviour.
Yasmine Mohammed, a Canadian-Palestinian ex-Muslim human rights activist who is now living in Europe, exchanged messages with him.
The scene of a vehicle-ramming attack is cordoned off at the Christmas market
A general view of the area, surrounded with police tape
Piled up clothes left behind at a cordoned off area at the scene of a vehicle-ramming attack
A barrier tape and police vehicles are seen in front of the entrance to the Christmas market in Magdeburg
Ms Mohammed told The Mail on Sunday that he complained about a German-based Saudi woman running an 'atheist refuge' for female asylum-seekers, accusing her of using the charity as a cover for a sex-trafficking ring.
'He started obsessively talking to me about her, and sending me documents to prove his point. I was once married to a jihadi, so I know how misogynistic men behave, and he was like that,' she said.
Ms Mohammed added: 'I thought his behaviour was unstable. I eventually told him that if he has all this evidence, why doesn't he go to the police. Eventually I told him not to contact me anymore and I blocked him.
'The last contact I had with him was September. But seeing what I saw [in the reports from Magdeburg] just made me sick. He claimed to be an atheist and that he was against ISIS, but he launched an attack like ISIS. He attacked Christians in a Christian market. It does not make sense.'
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14217709/Who-Magdeburg-suspect-Taleb-al-Abdulmohsen-Saudi-German-Christmas-attack.html
The Saudis warned the Germans over the suspect three times
Footage taken in the minutes after the crash, which happened at around 7pm, showed Taleb al-Abdulmohsen lying on the ground next to the smashed up BMW
Saudi Arabia recently issued three warnings about al-Abdulmohsen to German security authorities.
The Saudi suspect also took drugs before the attack.
Police had arrested him almost immediately after the attack, and said he tested positive for drugs.
The 50-year-old made a series of harrowing social media posts months before Friday's attack, including one where he vowed 'revenge will come soon, even if it costs me my life'.
The initial death toll from the horrific attack on Friday evening had stood at two, but this has since risen to five.
Bild, another local news site, reported that 41 others were gravely injured, 86 people are receiving hospital treatment for serious injuries, while another 78 sustained minor injuries.
German police can be seen aiming their weapons at Abdulmohsen shortly before his arrest
Bild reported that the car was driven 'at least 400m (1,300ft) across the Christmas market', per a police spokesperson
Local media reported that police raided al-Abdulmohsen's home in Bernburg, about 25 miles south of Magdeburg. Authorities added that he appears to have rented the car shortly before the attack.
The black BMW tore through the traditional market in the centre of Magdeburg, southwest of Berlin on Friday night.
Police said the vehicle drove 'at least 400 metres across the Christmas market' leaving behind destruction, debris and broken glass on the city's central town hall square.
Horrific video footage showed countless revellers fleeing for their lives in the wake of the crash. Separate footage showed children crying loudly as several small crowds of people formed over those injured in the crash, in apparent attempts to help them.
The Magdeburg Christmas market is located on the Old Market, directly next to Magdeburg Town Hall near the River Elbe, and was closed by organisers following the incident.
Local media reported that police raided al-Abdulmohsen's home in Bernburg, about 25 miles south of Magdeburg
Special police forces stand in front of an apartment building connected to the Christmas market attacker
The Salus Fachklinikum Bernburg, a medical center for psychiatry, psychosomatics and psychotherapy, where al-Abdulmohsen worked as a doctor, in Bernburg
Crime scene tape hangs at the site where a car drove into a crowd at a Magdeburg Christmas market
A police vehicle stands at the site where a car drove into a crowd at a Magdeburg Christmas market
Al-Abdulmohsen was due in court on Thursday on charges of 'misuse of an emergency number' but failed to turn up, according to Der Spiegel.
Cuddly toys, flowers and candles have all been laid in tribute to those killed and injured in the attack on Friday
Police officers stand at a barrier at Magdeburg's Christmas market on Saturday
Police officers walk at the cordoned-off Christmas Market on Saturday morning
Police were seen removing five large cardboard boxes containing evidence from the suspect's flat yesterday afternoon.
The killer lived on the ground floor of a smart apartment building in Bernburg some 30 miles away from the scene.
Several forensic officers were seen working inside the property for much of the day before removing the items in an unmarked police van.
Local residents said the police had arrived at the address at around 10pm on Friday night just hours after the deadly attack.
The killer lived in the apartment, where his name appears on the mailbox and doorbell, for several years.
'There were no sirens, just two vans arrived in the night and we had no idea what it was regarding,' one neighbour said.
'My cousin was working at the market at the time and saw what happened, he saw the bodies of children being thrown through the air by the car,' she added. 'But we didn't know the two were related at the time.'
Other neighbours said they had not known the suspect who kept to himself with his blinds drawn most of the time.
Taleb al-Abdulmohsen's name is displayed on the mailbox outside a house where he lived
The killer lived on the ground floor of this apartment building in Bernburg some 30 miles away from the scene
Al-Abdulmohsen's X bio reads: 'Germany chases female Saudi asylum seekers, inside and outside Germany, to destroy their lives."
He wrote on August 21: 'Is there a path to justice in Germany without bombing a German embassy or slaughtering German citizens indiscriminately? I have not found one."
In a post in December 2023, Abdulmohsen wrote: 'Germany is the only country – other than Saudi Arabia – that chases female Saudi asylum seekers all over the world to destroy their lives.'
He wrote: 'Revenge will come soon. Even if it costs me my life. I will make the German nation pay the price of the crimes committed by its government against Saudi refugees.'
In videos posted hours before the attack, he claimed that German authorities were opening his mail and stealing items including a USB stick. "I consider the Germans, as citizens, responsible for the persecution I am facing' he said in one video.
The car that was crashed into a crowd of people at the Magdeburg Christmas market is seen on Saturday morning following the attack in Magdeburg, Germany
'If a Syrian citizen applies for asylum in Germany, the chance to be granted asylum is 99.8%…
'While if a Saudi citizen applies for asylum in Germany, that chance is only 70%,"
'Germany is welcoming Syrians while simultaneously rejecting Saudis."
Special police officers at the scene after a car was driven into a crowd at the Christmas market in Magdeburg, Germany, 20 December 2024
The Magdeburg attack came eight years and a day after a jihadist attack in Berlin in which a Tunisian man committed to the Islamic State group rammed a truck through the capital's Christmas market, claiming 13 lives.
In 2006 Taleb A. fled Saudi Arabia after being accused of rape and other serious crimes. He pretended to be an ex-Muslin in order to get asylum.
That aligns with the Muslim practice of Taqiya, an Islamic doctrine that permits lying and deception.
The killer was pro-Hamas: "We will return Gaza to Hamas and if you like we will bring Hamas to your neighborhood so you can taste it."
He is a Shia extremist.
Robert Spencer has analyzed the situation.
https://gellerreport.com/2024/12/the-anti-islam-jihadi.html/
One source told CNN the Saudis alerted Germany to the individual identified by German media as Taleb A. in four official notifications. The notifications, known as “Notes Verbal,” were sent to the German intelligence services, with one to the country’s foreign ministry. The source said all of the warnings were ignored.
The first warning came in 2007 and was connected to concerns held by Saudi authorities that Taleb A. had expressed radical views of varying kinds.
Extradition request allegedly refused: Saudi Arabia considers him a fugitive and requested his extradition from Germany between 2007 and 2008, the source said, adding that German authorities refused, citing concerns for the man’s safety should he return.
Elon Musk has labeled German Chancellor Olaf Scholz an “incompetent fool” and called on him to resign “immediately” in a comment posted on X.
"He was obviously a lunatic who should never have been allowed to enter Germany and should have been extradited when Saudi Arabia made the request. Suicidal empathy by the German government," said the world's richest man.
"The guy is obviously an unhinged psychopath who should not have been allowed into Germany and should have been extradited when Saudi Arabia made the request," he replied to another user.
Germany has been hit by several Islamic knife attacks in the past few months. A stabbing spree by a Syrian suspect in August left three people dead at a street festival in Solingen. In June, a cop was killed in a knife attack by an Afghan man. The cop was so clueless that he tackled the victim who was holding the terrorist down, giving the terrorist the chance to get up and stab and kill the cop.
