BERLIN — A German court handed down a 13-year prison sentence Thursday to a young Syrian man who attacked and severely injured a Spanish visitor at Berlin’s Holocaust Memorial more than a year ago.
The 20-year-old perpetrator, identified by authorities only as Wassim Al M. following German privacy regulations, faced conviction on multiple charges including attempted murder and seeking membership in an international terrorist group, according to reports from German news agency dpa.
Court officials determined that he made the journey from Leipzig to Berlin on February 21, 2025, with the intention of conducting an assault on behalf of the Islamic State organization.
Presiding judge Doris Husch explained that the defendant selected the Holocaust Memorial as his target location because “he believed he would find people of Jewish faith there.” The attack involved stabbing the Spanish visitor in the neck area, followed by the perpetrator yelling “Allahu akbar,” meaning “God is great.”
The 31-year-old Spanish victim lived through the assault but continues to receive mental health care and remains unable to return to work.
Throughout the legal proceedings, the defendant claimed he immediately felt remorse for his actions and maintained that he had come to Berlin because of coercion from someone he met online while viewing Islamic State propaganda materials.
According to investigators, the defendant reached Germany in 2023 without adult supervision and received approved asylum status before settling in Leipzig. Police took him into custody approximately three hours following the attack when he approached law enforcement officers while covered in blood.
The Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe consists of 2,700 gray concrete blocks situated close to the Brandenburg Gate in central Berlin, serving as a tribute to the 6 million Jewish victims of the Holocaust.
This violent incident took place just two days prior to a nationwide German election where immigration policies had emerged as a major campaign topic, intensified by several fatal attacks involving immigrants in the preceding months.
