The Berlin Pride Attack Shames the German Establishment

A week on from the murderous attack on Berlin’s Pride festival, new details continue to emerge. Investigators have found a video on the phone of the perpetrator, Abdul Ballout, in which he claims responsibility on behalf of Islamic State (ISIS). It has also emerged that two of his cousins were ISIS fighters, while his uncle – Omar Bakri Muhammad – is an influential Islamist preacher in London.

We didn’t need these latest revelations to know this was an Islamist attack. This was already clear from Ballout’s profile – he was previously convicted on terrorism-related charges and had travelled to the Middle East in an attempt to join ISIS. But for the government and security experts, the latest news only deepens the embarrassment.

German chancellor Friedrich Merz, in particular, will surely regret the dishonest comments he made in the immediate aftermath of the attack. Speaking at a memorial service, he mumbled something about ‘stupid platitudes and bad jokes’ being the cause of the tragedy – leaving out the word Islamism entirely.

For Merz, whose approval ratings are now so low that many consider his fall to be imminent, the situation is serious. To the majority of the German public, his speech only highlighted the government’s utter helplessness in the face of the Islamist threat.