By Brandon Moseley
Alabama Political Reporter
On Friday, July 22, 2016, an 18 year-old man with a gun attacked a McDonalds and a shopping mall in Munich Germany. As of press time nine were confirmed dead in the terrorist attack in Munich. The violence ended only when the shooter killed himself.
US Representative Bradley Byrne said, “Please join me in praying for our friends in Germany. These vile acts of terror must stop.”
State Auditor Jim Zeigler said, “These murderers have reached another new low, shooting children eating at McDonald’s. We are safe nowhere unless we take the strongest measures to ban terrorists and illegals and arm ourselves to protect each other. In this Munich slaughter, only the terrorists were armed. The terrorists and criminals do not obey anti-gun laws such as they have in Germany.”
The lone gunman, Ali David Suboli, was the German born son of Iranian asylum seekers, with dual German and Iranian citizenship. Although he shouted anti-immigrant slurs and said, “I am a German”; he also reportedly shouted “Allahu Akbar.”
On Sunday, a sixteen year old Afghan teen was arrested on suspicion that he may have known of Suboli’s planning for the attack and did nothing to stop it. There is no evidence yet that this attack involved ISIS or any other terrorist group.
The victims included a 45 year old man and a 20 year old man. The rest of the victims were teens between ages 14 and 18. Multiple ethnicities were killed. Over two dozen persons were also wounded in the terror attack.
Suboli reportedly suffered from depression and has been treated by a psychiatrist. Suboli somehow had possession of a 9 mm Glock handgun and 300 rounds of ammunition. Suboli studied mass shootings and had been preparing for at least a year for his attack.
The attack follows a July 18 attack by a 17 year old Afghan refugee, Riaz Khan Ahmadzai, who attacked people with an axe and a knife, while traveling on a commuter train near the Bavarian town of Wuerzburg. Twenty one people were reportedly injured in the attack. Two of them remain in critical condition. ISIS has claimed responsibility for the attack and posted a video of Riaz Khan Ahmadzai declaring himself a fighter for the Islamic State. He entered Germany as an unaccompanied minor just last year.
On Sunday, July 24, a 27 year old Syrian refugee set off a bomb near a music festival in the city of Ansbach, Germany injuring at least 12 and killing himself.
Bavarian Interior Minister, Joachim Herrmann said that the man’s request for asylum was rejected a year ago, but he was allowed to remain in Germany because of the situation in Syria. Herrmann said that the man had tried to get in the music festival, but had been denied admission because he did not buy a ticket. The explosive device was in a backpack and was loaded with screws and nails to do maximum damage.
Also on Sunday, a pregnant woman was killed by a 21 year old male Syrian asylum seeker wielding a machete in the German city of Reutlingen. Two other people were injured in the attack. The attack ended when a motorist in a white BMW struck down the murderer. The Syrian attacker and the woman worked in the same snack bar and police are describing the attack as, “A crime of passion.”
There is no known evidence of any connection between all of these attacks.
The German people were disarmed in the 1930s by then Chancellor Adolph Hitler and Germany has some of the toughest limitations on gun rights in the world.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel has been widely criticized for opening Germany’s borders to one million Muslim refugees from Syria, Iraq, and Afghanistan. President Obama has praised her for being on the “right side of history” for the controversial decision.
The growing violence by Muslims across Europe has led to Republican Presidential nominee Donald Trump to call for limiting Muslim immigration to the United States until a system for better vetting the applicants can be established.
Presumptive Democratic Presidential nominee Hillary Clinton has called for increasing American acceptance of Muslim refugees: a plan that has been bitterly opposed by Alabama Governor Robert Bentley (R) and most of the Alabama congressional delegation, including Rep. Byrne and US Senators Richard Shelby and Jeff Sessions.
(Original reporting by Fox News, CNN, Sky News, DPA, NBC News, and the Associated Press all contributed to this report)
