German officials are facing urgent questions after a deadly attack near a Berlin Pride festival, including why suspect Abdul Ballout was at liberty despite a recent conviction linked to support for ISIS.
Chancellor Friedrich Merz said Monday that authorities must examine how the violent assault could have been stopped.
“We must do everything to protect people in Germany as best possible from such criminals, from dangerous people who for whatever reason can’t be taken into custody,” Merz said, according to The Associated Press.
Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt, speaking to public broadcaster ZDF, said the 21-year-old suspect’s conviction and history of support for the Islamic State raised serious concerns about why he had been allowed to remain free.
“You can assume that it certainly would have made sense to put this person in custody,” he noted, according to the report.
Authorities say a suspect with alleged links to Germany’s Islamist scene drove a van into a crowd near Berlin’s Pride festival before attacking others with a machete. Officials believe the incident was an Islamic terror attack that killed one person and injured at least 29 others, and the suspect remains on the run. (AP Photo/Markus Schreiber; Berlin Police)
Berlin Mayor Kai Wegner told regional broadcaster RBB that he did not want to challenge the independence of the judiciary, but said that, in the case of this attack, “words fail me.”
According to an English translation of a joint statement from the Berlin Public Prosecutor’s Office and the Berlin Court of Appeal, the suspect traveled to Lebanon last year intending to continue to Syria and join ISIS. The statement said the man “was born and raised in Berlin and is a German citizen.”
The attack on Saturday night left one dead and 29 injured, according to the AP, which reported that 21-year-old Abdul Ballout is suspected of plowing a van into people near a pride festival prior to apparently slashing people with a machete in what authorities think was a terror attack.
The suspect was killed by authorities on Sunday.
“According to current information, the 21-year-old allegedly attacked the special forces officers with a bladed weapon, whereupon they used their firearms,” an English translation of a July 26 joint press release from the Berlin Police and public prosecutor’s office noted. “The man suffered fatal injuries and died at the scene. The investigation is ongoing.”
Police officers stand near a vehicle crashed into a tree after driving into a crowd near Berlin’s annual Pride event, in Berlin, Germany, Sunday, July 26, 2026. (AP Photo/Markus Schreiber)
Earlier this year, a Berlin juvenile court convicted Ballout of preparing a serious act of violence endangering the state, and publishing propaganda supporting ISIS.
A news release from the Berlin Public Prosecutor’s Office and Berlin Court of Appeal said the court sentenced Ballout to one year and 10 months in youth custody before prosecutors appealed.
Officials have stated that the man was granted a suspended sentence, but the news release states: “The decision regarding the suspension of this sentence on probation was deferred for six months pursuant to Section 57 in conjunction with Section 61 Paragraph 1 of the Juvenile Courts Act. The court also imposed various conditions on Abdul B., including placing him under the supervision of a probation officer. The court lifted the existing arrest warrant, as pretrial detention primarily serves to secure the criminal proceedings and does not constitute a prejudicial punishment.”
Emergency personnel and police gather in Berlin, early Sunday, July 26, 2026, following the cancellation of Christopher Street Day festivities. (AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi)
The news release noted that the case was not over, given that the appeals process had yet to play out.
“This conviction is not yet legally binding, as the Berlin Public Prosecutor’s Office has filed an appeal. The Public Prosecutor’s Office had requested a longer, non-probationary sentence for a juvenile and the continuation of the arrest warrant,” the release noted.
