MAGDEBURG – Magdeburg has been enveloped in grief since an attack that killed a nine-year-old boy and four women at a Christmas market last Friday evening. About 200 people were also injured when a man rammed a car into the busy market in the eastern German city. The suspect, Taleb al-Abdulmohsen, a 50-year old Saudi-born psychiatrist who has lived in Germany since 2006, faces accusations of murder and attempted murder. Political parties across the spectrum have expressed sorrow for the victims and promised to step up security.

In a statement shared with Al Jazeera, Greens party leader Robert Habeck said he wished the city “comfort, strength and confidence”. Chancellor Olaf Scholz called the incident a “terrible and insane” act. Nicole Anger, a lawmaker and co-chairwoman of Die Linke (The Left) party in Magdeburg, said the city remains quiet and people are still stunned. “There are candlelight vigils, services and just a lot of moments of people standing together in solidarity. The salesmen from the Christmas market, which is closed for the rest of the year, have been giving away fruits and vegetables for free,” she told Al Jazeera.

But while many are united in grief, tensions are growing. Alongside vigils, more than 2,000 far-right supporters bearing banners and chanting slogans against migration gathered in the city on Saturday. Anger, who was born and raised in Magdeburg, said the atmosphere reminded her of the mid-1990s when one man was killed after far-right agitators chased a group of Black men through the city in what has come to be known as Himmelfahrtskrawalle, or the Magdeburg Ascension Day riots. “At the moment, children and people with a migration background are scared to be out on the streets,” she said.

The attack took place as Germans prepared to close off a heated political year.

After the coalition led by Scholz collapsed in November, the chancellor then lost a confidence vote in mid-December, triggering snap elections. Germans will head to the polls on February 23.

Meanwhile, the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party continues to gain political ground after successes in state elections this year. The day before the attack, US billionaire Elon Musk stirred controversy by posting on the X social media platform he owns: “Only the AfD can save Germany.” “We still have to be very cautious about what the attacker’s real motives were. But what is obvious is that if there is an extremist force in the political discourse which is actually not only Islamophobic but generally phobic against any foreigners, if this is articulated in this strong way as the AfD is constantly doing, it trickles down,” said Justus von Daniels, editor of the German publication Correctiv, which in January broke the news of a meeting between the AfD and neo-Nazi activists to discuss a migrant deportation “master plan”. (Al Jazeera)

Photo: Far-right demonstrators take part in a protest after a man drove a car into a crowded Christmas market, in Magdeburg. (Reuters)