A German court docket will sentence this Wednesday towards Abu Walaa – an Iraqi preacher who’s believed to be the “mind” of the Islamic State group in Germany – for having radicalized younger folks and directed a jihadist community.
Ahmad Abdulaziz Abdullah Abdullah, alias “Abu Walaa”, has been on trial for greater than three years in Celle, northern Germany, together with 4 alleged accomplices, amid imposing safety measures.
He’s accused of belonging to the IS and of supporting this “international terrorist group”. The defendants face sentences of between four and 11 years in jail. The lawyer for the primary defendant has requested his acquittal.
“Abu Walaa” was, based on the prosecution, “the consultant in Germany” of the Islamic State who maintained “direct contacts” with the leaders of the group, in addition to the “mind of the community” that despatched volunteer fighters from Germany to Syria or Iraq .
– “Faceless” –
In response to the indictment, Abu Walaa arrange a recruitment firm within the Hildesheim (Decrease Saxony) mosque and no less than eight, “largely very younger folks”, left, like German twin brothers who dedicated a bloody suicide assault in Iraq in 2015.
The principle accused arrived in Germany as an asylum seeker in 2001 and was arrested in November 2016 following a prolonged investigation by the intelligence providers.
He was very discreet and was often called “the faceless preacher” as a result of in his sermons on the net, fairly often, he by no means appeared dealing with the digital camera. He’s additionally accused of getting preached jihad within the Hildesheim mosque, now closed.
Amongst those that frequented the group is no less than one of many three youngsters who, on the age of 16, planted a bomb in April 2016 in a Sikh temple in Germany. The assault resulted in three accidents, one in all them critical. All have been sentenced to jail in 2017.
Anis Amri, the Tunisian who dedicated the assault with a truck on the Berlin Christmas market (12 useless in December 2016), appears to have frequented this community and maintained contact with one of many co-defendants, the German-Serbian Boban Simeonovic, a chemical engineer who al It appears he took him in at an Islamic college in Dortmund.
The Tunisian asylum seeker, shot useless by Italian police after fleeing Germany, was additionally in a Berlin mosque recognized for its hyperlinks to jihadism and the place Abu Walaa preached. Nevertheless, direct contact was by no means established between the 2 males.
– “Swindler” –
The accusation was based mostly primarily on the testimony of a supply within the German inside intelligence providers who for months gathered clues and proof towards the Iraqi preacher. Fearing for his life, this witness was exempted from testifying in court docket.
One other key supply, a disillusioned jihadist fighter who returned from former ISIS territories, additionally agreed to cooperate and inform how Abu Walaa’s community despatched him by way of Brussels and Turkey.
However Abu Walaa’s lawyer, Peter Krieger, believes that these accusations are based mostly on the statements of a witness who isn’t dependable as a result of he has been convicted as a member of IS. “The principle witness is a scammer,” he maintains.
Proper-wing terrorism has develop into the primary risk to safety in Germany, however the jihadist nebula continues to be energetic within the nation.
Three Syrian brothers, suspected of making ready bomb assaults, have been arrested in early February in Germany and Denmark.
Since 2009, German authorities have thwarted 17 such bombing makes an attempt, largely after the 2016 Berlin assault, based on the Inside Ministry.
The variety of Islamists thought of harmful in Germany has elevated fivefold from 2013 to 615, based on Inside.
mat / smk / erl / dga
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