German police arrest Syrian suspected of helping attack at Holocaust memorial

BERLIN – German police arrested on May 27 a Syrian citizen suspected of aiding and abetting attempted murder and grievous bodily harm in an attack on a tourist at the Holocaust Memorial in Berlin in 2025, prosecutors said.

The arrest of the suspect, identified as Khalaf A. in line with German privacy laws, follows the sentencing of a Syrian refugee, Wassim Al M., in March to 13 years behind bars for attempted murder.

The court found that Wassim Al M. was a radical Islamist with antisemitic views who had used a knife to stab a Spanish tourist in the neck at the memorial in February 2025. The tourist sustained life-threatening injuries.

Prosecutors said they suspected that Khalaf A. had spent the afternoon before the attack with Wassim Al M. and encouraged him to go ahead with his plan.

Reuters was not immediately able to contact the suspect’s lawyer.

The Holocaust memorial, a maze of concrete slabs in the heart of the German capital, commemorates the murder of six million Jews by Adolf Hitler’s Nazis. REUTERS