A Berlin court has sentenced a 20-year-old Syrian man to 13 years in prison for a jihadist-inspired knife attack on a Spanish tourist at the German capital’s Holocaust memorial.
The suspect, named only as Wassim Al M., was convicted of attempted murder, grievous bodily harm, and attempted membership of a terrorist organisation.
The attack occurred in February 2025, only days before Germany’s general election. The court confirmed that Al M. acted “in the name of the Islamic State (IS) group” and targeted a person of Jewish faith. The victim survived only because the knife missed major blood vessels by millimetres.
Al M. approached the 30-year-old victim from behind among the concrete steles of the memorial, inflicting a 14-centimetre (over five-inch) cut to his throat. Despite serious injuries, the victim managed to stagger out of the steles before collapsing in front of the memorial.
Al M. had traveled from his home in Leipzig to Berlin, motivated by his support for IS and the escalation of the Middle East conflict.
During the trial, the court revealed that Al M. had radicalised online and internalised IS ideology, rejecting Western society he lived in and believing he was on a holy mission against infidels.
He confessed to the crime and asked for forgiveness, claiming his actions were religiously inspired.
Prosecutors noted that he had sent a photo to IS members and offered his services as a fighter shortly before the attack. Al M. shouted “Allahu akbar” after the stabbing and was arrested when he returned to the scene with blood on his hands, carrying a copy of the Quran and a prayer rug.
