The man accused of a mass stabbing at a festival in the western German city of Solingen is due to face court in the North Rhine-Westphalia capital of Dusseldorf. Federal prosecutors have charged Syrian Issa Al H. with three counts of murder, 10 counts of attempted murder and membership in the terrorist organization "Islamic State " (IS).

The trial is scheduled to run from May 27 until September 22.

The case is politically loaded, a prime example of the challenges of dealing with Islamist-motivated violence. At the same time, it brings up fundamental questions about Germany's asylum and migration policies as well as its internal security.

What happened in Solingen?

On August 23, 2024, a Friday evening, an attacker with a knife targeted revelers at a Solingen street party, held to celebrate the western German city's 650th anniversary. He stabbed the people around him indiscriminately, right in front of the stage, deliberately aiming for their throats.

Three people were killed and 10 people were injured, some of them critically. The man who was charged, Issa Al H., was arrested a day later after turning himself in to police. The crime horrified Germany.

What is known about the defendant?

The Syrian, who was 26 at the time of the crime, arrived in Germany in December 2022 as an asylum-seeker. He had taken the so-called Balkan route via Bulgaria, and initially found shelter in an emergency accommodation center in the western city of Paderborn. Later, he was housed in Solingen, about 150 kilometers (92 miles) away. In his asylum application, he explained that he had left Syria to avoid military conscription.

Although Al H. should have been deported to Bulgaria, the process for his return failed. He was not known to the German security authorities as an Islamist before the attack.

Why was Issa Al H. still in Germany despite his rejected asylum application?

His planned deportation to Bulgaria in 2023 stalled because of bureaucratic failures and organizational hurdles. Issa Al H. was registered in Bulgaria in December 2022. According to the European Union's so-called Dublin Regulation, the southeastern European country was responsible for processing his asylum application.

Germany submitted a request for Bulgaria to take over the application, which was agreed to. A six-month window was allowed for his transfer, but it expired. When Al H. was due to be deported from Germany to Bulgaria on June 5, 2023, he could not be found at his accommodation in Paderborn.

He returned shortly thereafter, but the facility's managers did not tell the relevant immigration authority that he was back. Officials also failed to organize a new flight to deport him.

Because Germany missed the six-month deadline, they became responsible under the Dublin Regulation for processing his asylum application.

Were there other problems with the unsuccessful deportation?

Logistical constraints further hampered deportation to Bulgaria. Transfers were only possible on certain weekdays and at certain times via scheduled flights to Sofia. This led to the situation where there could only be about 10 deportations a week to Bulgaria from the whole of Germany.

Why was the attack referred to as Islamist-motivated act of terror?

The Public Prosecutor General accused the defendant of being a member of the so-called "Islamic State" terror group, and accordingly of having decided to commit "an attack on those he viewed as infidels."

According to the indictment, the defendant was in contact with members of the fundamentalist Islamist terror organization via a messenger service. They had assured him that IS would claim responsibility for the attack and use it as propaganda.

After the attack, IS announced that it was committed by one of its "soldiers."

What political debates were spurred by the attack?

The terror attack in Solingen intensified the already fraught dispute about asylum and migration in Germany, and was a hot topic during the recent federal election campaign.

The Alternative for Germany (AfD) party — which is in parts right-wing extremist — especially used the bloody attack to advance its migration-critical agenda.

Researchers who study extremism warned against instrumentalizing the Solingen attack, and emphasized the danger of an increase in anti-Muslim sentiment.

How did the old German government under Chancellor Olaf Scholz react?

At the time, Chancellor Olaf Scholz spoke of a "terrible crime." Germany must respond with the full force of the law, the center-left Social Democrat (SPD) politician said shortly afterwards.

A few weeks later, the then-ruling coalition of the SPD, Greens and neoliberal Free Democrats (FDP) agreed on a "security package." It included quicker deportations, more supervision for people who could pose a threat to public safety and more spaces in pre-deportation detention centers.

In addition, weapons laws were tightened to make it more difficult for people to access and carry knives and other potentially dangerous objects.

What has the new government under Chancellor Friedrich Merz done?

Following the change of government in early May, the new coalition of the conservative Christian Democrats and Christian Social Union (CDU/CSU) and the SPD, led by Chancellor Friedrich Merz of the CDU, decided upon several measures to tighten asylum policies, including a de facto entry ban of migrants who do not have sufficient paperwork.

They also expanded pre-deportation detention to more effectively manage the return of people obliged to leave the country. In addition, they strengthened border controls to limit irregular migration.

In his first state of the nation speech, Merz defended the harsher approach to asylum policy and emphasized the necessity of the measures for domestic security. The Greens accused the government of a lack of consultation with European Union partners, while the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) criticized that the regulations did not go far enough.

This article was originally written in German.

Editor's note: DW follows the German press code, which stresses the importance of protecting the privacy of suspected criminals or victims and urges us to refrain from revealing the full names of alleged criminals.

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