Moment protester sparks outrage by interrupting minute’s silence for Magdeburg Christmas market assault at German soccer match

This is the moment a protester sparked outrage by interrupting a minute’s silence for the Magdeburg Christmas market attack at a German football match.

Footage from the stadium in Essen shows players from third-tier teams Rot-Weiss Essen and VfB Stuttgart II standing with their heads bowed as they and the spectators hold a minute of silence for the victims of Friday night’s devastating attack. 

But the minute’s silence was interrupted by a man who screamed the racist phrase: ‘Germany for the Germans’, which was used by Hitler and the Nazis and is utilised by extremists today to convey that ‘non-Germans aren’t welcome’. 

Other fans reacted quickly by chanting ‘Nazis out’, while others held up a banner reading: ‘Stay strong Magdeburg.’ Their prompt condemnation of the racist exclamation was praised by the spokesman for Rot-Weiss Essen.

The spokesman told German media that the prompt reaction by fans in the stadium was a ‘very clear and wonderful sign of what the spectators and we as a club think of this unspeakable interjection in this touching moment’.

The man, who was identified as a 57-year-old German citizen living in Essen, was escorted out of the stadium and police reportedly said a complaint for incitement of hatred had been filed against him. 

This came after Taleb al-Abdulmohsen, 50, rammed his SUV into a packed market in the town of Magdeburg around 7pm on Friday, killing nine-year-old André Gleißner and four women aged 45, 52, 67 and 75.

Al-Abdulmohsen was remanded in pretrial custody last night after prosecutors pressed charges of murder on five counts, multiple counts of attempted murder and grievous bodily harm, according to a police statement.

Social media accounts falsely alleged al-Abdulmohsen was an Islamist terrorist shortly after the attack, but the German interior minister later identified the suspect as being Islamophobic himself. 

A harsh critic of Germany’s past welcome too many Muslim migrants, al-Abdulmohsen wrote on the platform X that he wished ex-chancellor Angela Merkel could be jailed for life or executed.

In 2015, Merkel implemented an ‘open door’ policy, which allow over a million asylum seekers to cross the border into Germany.

The exiled Saudi attacker had praised hard-Right politicians for combating the ‘Islamisation’ of Europe and pledged to take ‘revenge’ over harassment of female refugees.

Al-Abdulmohsen had voiced support for Elon Musk, Tommy Robinson and Alternative for Germany, the hard-right anti-immigration party, trying to build connections to hard-right organisations in Germany and the UK.

Musk reposted a tweet by Nigel Farage which blamed the Christmas market attack on border policies.

Tensions in Magdeburg were running high last night when around 700 hard-right demonstrators gathered, with people holding a banner with the word ‘Remigration Now’ and so-called homeland flags. 

The protesters, described by German tabloid Bild as right-wing extremists and hooligans, marched through Magdeburg shouting: ‘Anyone who doesn’t love Germany should leave Germany’, ‘Migration kills’ and ‘We must take back our cities, our villages and our homeland’. 

Some of the demonstrators reportedly wore masked and were aggressive, resulting in minor scuffles with police. 

A known neo-Nazi called Thorsten Heise reportedly stirred up the crowd by yelling: ‘Deport, deport, deport’ and ‘Resistance’.

The masked protestors who waved anti-immigration posters and shouted chants of ‘migration kills’ were escorted by hundreds of police in full riot gear as they marched through the city.

‘Among the demonstrators were many extremely violent far-right groups from across Germany. Many of them were masked,’ said Oliver Kreuzfeld, an expert on the far-right scene from Endstation Rechts, an initiative against extremism based in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern.

Kreuzfeld observed the demonstration and identified members of violent neo-Nazi groups known for past violent attacks on trains. They also included members of long-established groups, like the Neonazi Kiez in Dortmund.

An expert has now warned that right-wing groups could attempt to exploit the tragic incident for their own ends. 

Matthias Quent, Professor of Sociology at Magdeburg-Stendal University of Applied Sciences, told EuroNews: ‘The region in general, eastern Germany, is a hotspot of far-right mobilisations. 

‘And we are facing election campaigns until the federal elections in February. 

‘And so this is not just a critical time because of Christmas and the trust that gets destroyed by such an attack but, also, regarding questions of disinformation and polarisation and the spread of hate that will and could happen over these kinds of attacks now.’ 

As the surging AfD party seeks to rally support in the run-up to Germany’s snap federal election, the chair pointedly asked ‘When will this madness end?’

Tempers are strained after it was revealed police were warned about the ‘unstable’ suspect in September last year, but did nothing more than take screenshots of his twisted online threats.

Local outlet Die Welt reported that German state and federal police had carried out a ‘risk assessment’ on al-Abdulmohsen last year but concluded that he posed ‘no specific danger’. 

Chancellor Olaf Scholz has condemned the ‘terrible, insane’ attack and made a call for national unity amid high political tensions as Germany heads towards February 23 elections.

But as German media dug into al-Abdulmohsen’s past, and investigators gave away little, criticism has rained down from the far-right and far-left parties already bitterly opposed to the Scholz government.

The Saudi suspect, psychiatrist and anti-Islam activist al-Abdulmohsen, had made online death threats against German citizens and had a history of quarrelling with state authorities.

News magazine Der Spiegel, citing security sources, said the Saudi secret service had warned Germany’s spy agency BND a year ago about a tweet in which al-Abdulmohsen threatened Germany would pay a ‘price’ for its treatment of Saudi refugees.

And in August al-Abdulmohsen wrote on social media: ‘Is there a path to justice in Germany without blowing up a German embassy or randomly slaughtering German citizens?… If anyone knows it, please let me know.’

In a post in December last year, he wrote: ‘Germany is the only country – other than Saudi Arabia – that chases female Saudi asylum seekers all over the world to destroy their lives.

‘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.’

Police who arrested him almost immediately after the attack said he tested positive for drugs.

The 50-year-old was brought before a judge on Saturday evening, and police said: ‘The judge ordered pre-trial detention for five counts of murder, multiple attempted murder and multiple counts of dangerous bodily harm.’

The prosecutor said that the medic’s grievance about how Germany was treating Saudi dissident asylum seekers was part of the investigation as a possible motive.

Al-Abdulmohsen had bypassed security bollards and used an emergency corridor – which should have been blocked for anything other than ambulances and police vehicles – to enter the market. 

Hospital staff rallied around victims of the attack, with 120 nurses and more than 20 doctors voluntarily putting in extra shifts that tragic to treat those who were hurt.

He launched his attack just after 7pm local time in Germany, as thousands of shoppers gathered at the centre of Magdeburg.

Driving slowly at first, the blue SUV turned in to an alleyway where hundreds of shoppers were browsing stalls and sipping mulled wine.

He then pointed his vehicle directly at the crowd and ploughed forward. As shoppers fled in panic, the driver turned another corner and drove out of the market. 

An off-duty policeman pursued the BMW until he came to a halt outside Magdeburg shopping centre, where he was arrested at gunpoint by armed officers.