BERLIN, July 29 -- The man who killed one and injured six in a supermarket in northern German city of Hamburg on Friday was a known Islamist and failed asylum seeker, local police said Saturday.
Police spokesperson Andy Grote told a press conference that the man was known as an Islamist but not a jihadist, and added that the suspect suffered from mental illness.
The 26-year-old Palestinian, named as Ahmad A. who was born in the United Arab Emirates, stabbed a German man to death with a kitchen knife and injured other six in an indiscriminate and sudden attack, the police said.
Some eyewitnesses said the perpetrator shouted "Allahu Akbar" during hit act.
Joerg Froehlich, Hamburg's prosecutor general, said the offender was known to the Hamburg public prosecutor as an Islamist. In April the suspect had already been conspicuous for shoplifting, but the judicial procedure was stopped at that time for insignificance.
Torsten Voss, head of the Hamburg branch of the domestic intelligence agency, said at the press conference that the perpetrator was first registered in Dortmund and was later sent to Hamburg in March 2017. Two months later, the suspect filed an asylum application, which was rejected in November 2016.
The attacker should have been a lone, and had a destabilized, uncertain personality, suffering from an alcohol problem, Voss added.
The police on Saturday had searched a refugee shelter in the Hamburg district of Langenhorn, where the suspect was believed to have been staying.
According to Deutsche Welle, Hamburg Mayor Olaf Scholz said it appeared that the suspect was facing deportation but this had not proceeded because necessary papers were lacking.
"I am furious that the offender is apparently someone who has claimed protection with us in Germany and then directed his hate against us," the mayor said.
Since 2017, over 1.2 million refugees poured into Germany, leading to the deterioration of public security situation, especially the potential terrorist attacks.
Germany has suffered several terrorist attacks in less than a year. One of the deadly cases took place in December last year, when a truck was deliberately driven into the Christmas market next to the Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church in Berlin, leaving 12 people dead and 56 others injured.
The suspect of the Berlin attacker is a Tunisian national named Anis Amri, who is also a rejected asylum seeker.