German man goes on trial for deadly Halle synagogue shooting

A German man is to go on trial for a deadly shooting targeting Jews in the eastern city of Halle last year, one of the worst acts of antisemitic violence in Germany’s postwar history.

Stephan Balliet, 28, is accused of shooting dead two people in October after he tried and failed to storm a synagogue. He has been charged with two counts of murder and multiple counts of attempted murder.

Prosecutors say Balliet used explosives and firearms to try to gain access to the synagogue, where 52 worshippers were celebrating Yom Kippur, the holiest day in the Jewish calendar.

After failing to break through the locked wooden door, he shot dead a female passerby and a man in a nearby kebab shop. He filmed the assault and livestreamed it on the internet.

The attack shocked Germany and fuelled alarm about rising rightwing extremism and anti-Jewish violence, 75 years after the end of the Nazi era.

The German chancellor, Angela Merkel, who attended a vigil at a Berlin synagogue after the attack, said the bloodshed in Halle showed Germany had “to do more” to protect Jewish people.

Prosecutors in the trial, which begins on Tuesday, said Balliet made a “very comprehensive” confession, confirming “far-right and antisemitic motives”.

Balliet published documents online that called for the killing of all Jews.

His video of the attack will be shown in court. Balliet faces an additional charge of incitement to hatred for denying the Holocaust in the footage.

According to a report in Der Spiegel magazine, a psychological assessment of Balliet concluded he had a complex personality disorder with elements of autism. However, he was deemed to be aware of his actions and not exempt from criminal responsibility, the report said.

Baillet “described the fatal shots fired at his two victims in Halle without emotion” and appeared disappointed he had failed in his attempt to enter the synagogue, Norbert Leygraf, a psychiatrist, was cited as saying.

The trial is being held at the district court in Magdeburg and is scheduled to last until mid-October. If convicted, Baillet could face life in prison.

The synagogue’s door, which still bears the bullet holes from the assault, is to be removed and used for a communal art project.

President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, regarded by many as Germany’s moral compass, said in his Christmas speech last December it was “a miracle” the door had resisted the attack, saving dozens of lives.

“It also symbolises what we stand for. Are we strong and resistant? Do we stand by each other enough?” he said.

The Halle attack came three months after the murder of the local pro-migrant politician Walter Lübcke in the western city of Kassel, allegedly by a known neo-Nazi.

The trial in that case began last month, with prosecutors claiming the 46-year-old suspect, Stephan Ernst, was motivated by “extreme rightwing political convictions”.

In February, a gunman with apparent far-right beliefs killed nine people at a shisha bar and a cafe in the city of Hanau, near Frankfurt.

The interior minister, Horst Seehofer, has since declared far-right extremism the “biggest security threat facing Germany”, and promised to strengthen the security response.