Abu Walaa

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Ahmad Abdulaziz Abdullah Abdullah (* 1984 ), known as Abu Walaa , is a Salafist preacher from Iraq who is active in Germany . He is suspected of being the number 1 terrorist organization Islamic State (IS) in Germany and of recruiting young Muslims in Germany for the IS jihad . He was arrested in November 2016; criminal proceedings were opened in September 2017.

background

Mosque of the German-speaking Islamic Circle (DIK) in Hildesheim

Abu Walaa comes from Kirkuk and entered Germany in 2001, where he applied for asylum. After trying his hand at selling jeans and selling a soft drink, he worked as an Islamic preacher in Hildesheim and was known to many Muslims nationwide through his video sermons. He preached in the mosque of the German-speaking Islamic group Hildesheim e. V. (DIK). Since a raid in July 2016, the Lower Saxony Interior Minister Boris Pistorius initiated a ban against the association . The Attorney General at the Federal Court of Justice announced that Abu Walaa had appeared as a speaker at numerous Salafist events. He assumes that the goal of the network he cited was to refer people to ISIS in Syria. On March 14, 2017, Interior Minister Pistorius banned the association.

Abu Walaa had around 25,000 fans on his Facebook page. He was also featured on various other Islamist pages on Facebook. He became known as the "preacher without a face" because he can only be seen from behind in his videos. He often wears a black hooded cloak, similar to the portrayal of the Prophet Mohammed in Islamic iconography . Walaa was at odds with other Salafist preachers such as Abdul Adhim Kamouss and Pierre Vogel . Although both represent a fundamentalist worldview, they firmly reject IS and warn their supporters against joining the terrorist militia. The IS therefore called on its supporters to kill Vogel. After the arrest of Walaa, Vogel posted on his Facebook page "May Allah save us from the evil of 'Abu Walaa' and its lies".

Investigations

Although the authorities had been investigating Abu Walaa for a long time and the Office for the Protection of the Constitution observed him, nothing could be proven that he was a judge for a long time. The federal prosecutor's office finally found a key witness in the German Turk Anil O. (born 1994) . He reported how Abu Walaa got him enthusiastic about jihad in his Hildesheim mosque. O. traveled with his family from Germany via Turkey to Syria in August 2015 and joined the terrorist organization Islamic State (IS). There he was trained in handling weapons. He called on Muslims in Germany from Syria to also come to the IS-controlled area. The Federal Prosecutor had O. arrested at Düsseldorf Airport on his return from Syria at the end of September 2016 .

Anis Amri , who carried out the attack on the Berlin Christmas market at the Memorial Church in 2016 , is said to have belonged to the Walaas network. Dasbar W., who will soon have to answer for a suspected attack on the Karlsruhe Christmas market, also attended a seminar at Walaa in the now banned mosque association Deutschsprachiger Islamkreis (DIK) in Hildesheim.

arrest

On the morning of November 8, 2016, the police arrested Abu Walaa in Bad Salzdetfurth and four alleged accomplices in Hildesheim and North Rhine-Westphalia. They were accused of supporting a foreign terrorist organization under Section 129b of the Criminal Code. The North Rhine-Westphalian Interior Minister Ralf Jäger said after the arrest: “We have managed a sensitive blow against the chief ideologues of the Salafist scene in Germany. [...] Today it was concluded what was determined over many months in good cooperation between the state criminal investigation offices in Lower Saxony, North Rhine-Westphalia and the federal prosecutor's office. "

process

The criminal trial against Abu Walaa and four other alleged Islamists in his network began on September 26, 2017 before the State Security Senate of the Celle Higher Regional Court . They are said to have motivated young people as fighters for IS and brought them on their way to the Middle East. The prosecutor general's indictment accuses Walaa of membership in a foreign terrorist organization, the other four accused of supporting this foreign terrorist organization.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Christoph Elflein: Anis Amri and Abu Walaa: investigation files show methods of radicalization. In: Focus Online . December 31, 2016, accessed October 14, 2018 .
  2. ↑ Markus Decker: "Preacher without a face": hate preacher Abu Walaa in Celle in court. In: Berliner Zeitung , September 26, 2017.
  3. ↑ Alexander Haneke: Summer camp before the war. In: Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung , September 26, 2017.
  4. ^ Ministry of the Interior bans Salafist association. In: Spiegel Online , March 14, 2016.
  5. ^ Call for murder against Salafists: Pierre Vogel is on the IS hit list. In: n-tv.de , April 14, 2016.
  6. ↑ a b Christoph Sydow: Police provide the "preacher without a face". In: Spiegel Online , November 8, 2016, accessed September 30, 2019.
  7. ↑ Anis Amri and his emir . In: Focus , December 31, 2016.
  8. ↑ tagesschau.de: Terror suspect in Karlsruhe: contacts with hate preachers. Retrieved January 16, 2018 (German).
  9. ↑ Members of a national Salafist-jihadist network arrested. The Federal Prosecutor General at the Federal Court of Justice, press release 55/2016, November 8, 2016.
  10. ↑ Reinhard Bingener, Reiner Burger: Terror suspects arrested: The network of Abu Walaa . In: Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung . November 8, 2016 ( faz.net [accessed November 9, 2016]).
  11. ↑ Start of the process in Celle. "Preacher without a face" in court , Deutschlandfunk , September 26, 2017
  12. ^ Higher Regional Court of Celle - press release. September 18, 2017: Trial against Ahmad Abdulaziz Abdullah A. et al
personal data
SURNAME Abu Walaa
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Abdullah, Ahmad Abdulaziz Abdullah (real name); A., Ahmad Abdulaziz Abdullah
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Iraqi man who works as an Islamic preacher in Germany
DATE OF BIRTH 1984
PLACE OF BIRTH Iraq