ISIS Suicide Bombing Sets Germany on Edge Series of attacks over past week add new fuel to debate over migrants and security By Anton Troianovski and Ruth Bender And Todd Buell
http://www.wsj.com/articles/isis-suicide-bombing-sets-germany-on-edge-1469485277
Terror militia Islamic State on Monday claimed responsibility for a suicide bombing in southern Germany—the latest in a string of attacks that have shattered the country’s sense of calm and stoked tensions over accepting migrants.
The Sunday night blast that injured 15 people outside a concert venue in the Bavarian town of Ansbach was the second attack to be claimed by Islamic State here in a week and the first jihadist suicide bombing in the country.
The bomber was a 27-year-old Syrian asylum applicant identified by authorities as Mohammad D., who had been in Germany for about two years but was facing deportation. Authorities said he had pledged allegiance to Islamic State’s leader in a video found on his smartphone.
ENLARGE The revelations focused more attention on the security implications of the more than a million refugees and migrants who arrived in the last year-and-a-half, and raised pressure on Chancellor Angela Merkel to ramp up domestic security.
“It is clear that with these attacks in quick succession, the worries and fears in our population will grow,” said Bavarian Interior Minister Joachim Herrmann, whose conservative Christian Social Union is allied with Ms. Merkel but has called on her to limit the number of asylum applicants.
The run of violence began July 18 when a teenager who had registered as an Afghan refugee injured five people with an ax in Würzburg, an attack also claimed by Islamic State.
On Friday, an 18-year-old Iranian-German who officials say was obsessed with mass shootings went on a shooting spree in Munich, killing nine. And on Sunday, a 21-year-old Syrian asylum applicant killed a 45-year-old Polish woman with a large knife after what police suspected was a personal dispute.
Investigators said the Ansbach attacker, whose surname was withheld under German privacy law, came from Aleppo in Syria and appeared to have war wounds, suggesting he had military experience.
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