What we know about the Magdeburg Christmas market attack suspect
Questions remain about the motive behind Friday's attack in Germany, which saw five people killed, including a nine-year-old boy.
A man suspected of driving a car into a crowd at a Christmas market in eastern Germany, killing at least five people and injuring more than 200 others, faces charges of murder and attempted murder.
Officials said a nine-year-old boy was among those killed after a black BMW ploughed into shoppers in the eastern city of Magdeburg at around 7pm on Friday evening.
The charges follow reported clashes at a far-right demonstration in the city attended by around 2,100 people on Saturday night, while other residents took part in remembrance events.
While Europe's far-right have seized on the attack to push an anti-Islam and anti-migration agenda, the motives of the suspect, a 50-year-old Saudi refugee who has described himself as "anti-Islam", remain unclear.
Here, Yahoo News explains what is known so far about the suspect and the ongoing case.
What we know
The suspect has been named only as Taleb A by German media due to the country's strict privacy laws, but has widely been identified by international media as Taleb Jawad al-Abdulmohsen.
The doctor has lived in Germany since 2006 and has a permanent residency permit, and, according to the AFP, was granted refugee status 10 years later.
Al-Abdulmohsen, who was arrested in the car used in the attack, is being kept in custody after being charged with five counts of murder and multiple counts of attempted murder and grievous bodily harm.
The suspect had worked as a psychiatrist at a specialist rehabilitation clinic for criminals with addictions in Bernburg, a town of 30,000 people south of Magdeburg, since March 2020. In a statement, the facility said: "Since the end of October 2024, he has been absent due to holiday and illness."
On Monday, the AFP news agency reported that Saudi Arabia had requested his extradition from Germany before the incident.
A source told AFP that Saudi Arabia warned Germany "many times" that he "could be dangerous".
Al-Abdulmohsen, who lived in Bernburg, had appeared in a number of media interviews in 2019, describing his work as an activist helping Saudi Arabians who had turned their backs on Islam flee to Europe.
In a BBC documentary from July 2019, he speaks about founding the platform wearesaudis.net after he became an atheist and claimed asylum in Germany. In an interview with Germany's FAZ newspaper the previous month, he said: "There is no good Islam."
His account on social media platform X, verified by the Reuters news agency, indicated support for the far-right, anti-immigration party Alternative for Germany (AfD), as well as for tech mogul Elon Musk - who has expressed support for the AfD and has criticised German chancellor Olaf Scholz.
CNN reported that al-Abdulmohsen had previously posted anti-Islam statements on social media that had grown more threatening in recent months.
In May, he posted on X: "German terrorism will be brought to justice. It's very likely that I will die this year in order to bring justice."
Three months later, in August, he posted: "I assure you that if Germany wants a war, we will fight it. If Germany wants to kill us, we will slaughter them, die, or go to prison with pride."
Al-Abdulmohsen, who is from a Shia family, was well-known in the Saudi diaspora in the country and helped asylum seekers, particularly women. However, Taha Al-Hajji, legal director of the Berlin-based European Saudi Organisation for Human Rights, claims he was "a pariah" among Germany's Saudi community.
"He is a psychologically disturbed person with an exaggerated sense of self-importance," she told AFP. "This is definitely not an Islamist-motivated attack."
Al-Abdulmohsen has no known links to Islamist groups.
What we don't know
The motive behind Friday's attack remains unclear, with investigators probing al-Abdulmohsen's criticism of German authorities' treatment of Saudi refugees, among other things.
In a social media post from last August, according to AFP, he was critical of the "crimes committed by Germany against Saudi refugees and the obstruction of justice".
"Is there a path to justice in Germany without blowing up a German embassy or randomly slaughtering German citizens?," he is reported to have written.
"I have been seeking a peaceful path since January 2019 and have not found it. If anyone knows it, please let me know."
Friedrich Merz, leader of the opposition Christian Democrats and current favourite to succeed Scholz as chancellor, cautioned against drawing hasty conclusions. "Yesterday's horrific act in Magdeburg does not fit the familiar pattern," he said.
German interior minister Nancy Faeser said the suspect's Islamophobia was clear to see, but she declined to comment on the motive.
Questions also remain about al-Abdulmohsen's past, and whether authorities should have picked up on potential dangers sooner.
A Saudi source told Reuters that Saudi Arabia had warned German authorities about the suspect after he posted extremist views on his X account that threatened peace and security. A German security source said Saudi authorities had made several tip-offs in 2023 and 2024 and that these had been passed on to the relevant security authorities.
A risk assessment conducted last year by German state and federal criminal investigators came to the conclusion that the man posed "no specific danger", the Welt newspaper reported, citing security sources.
Magdeburg police chief Tom-Oliver Langhans said police had conducted an evaluation into a potential threat posed by al-Abdulmohsen, the BBC reports, adding: "But that discussion was one year ago".
A counter-terrorism expert told the broadcaster the Saudis may have been mounting a disinformation campaign to discredit a man who was trying to help young Saudi women flee to Germany to seek asylum.
