Germany updates: Unborn baby among 7 killed in Hamburg shooting

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has said that he was left “speechless” by the shooting at a Jehovah’s Witness place of worship in his hometown of Hamburg and his thoughts went out to the victims and their relatives.

“We fear that further victims may die from their severe wounds,” he said, thanking security forces for their work.

The gunman who shot dead seven people at a Jehovah’s Witnesses centre in Hamburg before turning the gun on himself was a former member of the religious group, according to the police.

“Philipp F was a former member” of the Jehovah’s Witnesses, authorities said, adding that the attacker left the community about 18 months ago “but apparently not on good terms”.

There was “no indication of a terrorist background” to the attack, a spokesman for the Hamburg prosecution’s office said.

Hamburg chief of police says the attacker was in legal possession of a semi-automatic pistol since December.

Ralf Martin Meyer added at a news conference that the perpetrator shot nine magazines of ammunition during the attack in Hamburg.

Authorities said 50 guests were attending the event in the building at the time of the attack.

The suspect who shot dead seven people at a Jehovah’s Witnesses centre in Hamburg killed himself after police stormed the building, the regional interior minister says, adding that a pregnant woman was among the victims.

The attacker fled to the first floor of the building after police burst in “and killed himself”, said Andy Grote, adding that the rapid police deployment likely “saved many lives”.

A woman who was seven months pregnant was among those killed, he added.

Al Jazeera’s William Peacock, reporting from Hamburg, says undertaker vans took two coffins from the building where the shooting took place.

“The bodies being removed,” he said.

“We are waiting to hear from the police in Hamburg imminently [11:00 GMT] on the latest casualty figures and perhaps who this person was,” he added.

Journalist Dagmar Gehm, reporting from Hamburg, says a news conference by the police is expected at 11:00 GMT probably to give more information on the attack.

“We don’t know the reason why the perpetrator attacked the members of the [Jehovah’s Witnesses] community,” she said.

“The community is known for their peaceful background. They are kind people,” she said.

The head of Germany’s GdP police union in Hamburg, Horst Niens, says he is convinced that the swift arrival of a special operations unit “distracted the perpetrator and may have prevented further victims”.

Officers apparently reached the hall while the attack was ongoing and heard one more shot after they arrived, according to witnesses and authorities.

French President Emmanuel Macron has expressed his dismay following the shooting in Hamburg.

“Terrible news from Hamburg. I send France’s condolences to the relatives of the victims and to all our German friends. Our thoughts are with them,” Macron wrote on Twitter on Friday.

Police have asked witnesses of the attack in Hamburg to come forward and upload any pictures or videos they may have to a special website.

Interior minister Nancy Faeser said investigators were “working flat-out to determine the background” to the attack.

News weekly Der Spiegel reported that the suspected attacker was a former member of the Jehovah’s Witness community who was not a known “extremist”.

The magazine, which did not cite its sources, described him as a man aged 30-40 and said he had been armed with a handgun.

The Jehovah’s Witnesses community in Germany has expressed deep sadness over an “horrific” deadly shooting in Hamburg that it said targeted its members.

“The religious community is deeply saddened by the horrific attack on its members at the Kingdom Hall in Hamburg after a religious service,” the Jehovah’s Witnesses in Germany association said in a statement.

Eight people have been killed in the shooting at a Jehovah’s Witnesses hall in Hamburg, German police have said.

Police gave the figure on their website. There was still no word on a possible motive for the shooting.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has said his thoughts were with the victims of the shooting in Hamburg.

“Several members of a Jehovah community fell victim to a brutal act of violence last night,” Scholz tweeted. “My thoughts are with them and their loved ones.”

Gregor Miesbach, who lives within sight of the building where the shootings took place, has said that he was alerted by the sound of shots and filmed a figure entering the building through a window.

He said that shots could then be heard from inside. Miesbach told German television news agency NonstopNews that he heard at least 25 shots.

A witness has said that “there were about four periods of shooting” during the incident, according to German news agency dpa.

“There were always several shots in these periods, roughly at intervals of 20 seconds to a minute,” Laura Bauch, a student who lives nearby, said.

She added that she looked out her window and saw a person running from the ground floor to the second floor of the Jehovah’s Witnesses hall.

Germany has been shaken by a number of shootings and violent attacks in the last few years.

In February 2020, a gunman with suspected far-right links shot dead nine people, including people from Turkey, in the western town of Hanau before killing himself and his mother.

In October 2019, a gunman killed two people when he opened fire outside a synagogue in the eastern city of Halle on the Jewish holy day of Yom Kippur.

Among the deadliest attacks was a truck rampage at a Berlin Christmas market in December 2016 that killed 12 people. The Tunisian attacker, a failed asylum seeker, was a supporter of ISIL (ISIS).

German police will hold a press conference scheduled for Friday at about midday local time (11:00 GMT) on the state of their investigation into the attack at the Jehovah’s Witnesses’ Kingdom Hall building in Hamburg.

Police in Hamburg have classified the crime as a rampage, security sources told the German news agency Deutsche Presse-Agentur (dpa).

Though police have not confirmed the number of dead and injured, all of those killed suffered gunshot wounds, according to a police spokesperson, dpa reported.

Police are focusing their investigation on the motive for the attack on the Jehovah’s Witnesses centre as they believe a gunman acting alone was responsible for the deadly violence, Reuters news agency has reported.

Police have declined to say how many people were killed but said the gunman was believed to be among the dead.

Germany’s Bild newspaper reported that seven people died and eight were wounded in the shooting.

“According to the current state of affairs, we assume that there is one perpetrator,” police said in a message on Twitter.

“Police activities in the surrounding area are being successively discontinued. Investigations into the motives behind the crime are continuing.”

• The Jehovah’s Witnesses – an international Christian denomination – was founded in the United States in the 19th century and has a more than 100-year history in Germany.
• There are about 2,020 Jehovah’s Witness congregations and 170,491 ministers (the baptised Witnesses) in Germany, according to the denomination’s website.
• Members are known for their evangelistic efforts including knocking on doors and distributing literature in public squares.
• In 2017, they received the same legal status granted to leading religions in Germany.
• In 2021, the German State Parliament commemorated the Jehovah’s Witnesses’ courageous stand against Nazi abuse.
• About 1,500 Jehovah’s Witnesses died during the Holocaust out of about 35,000 who lived in Germany and Nazi-occupied countries at the time. They were persecuted by the Nazi government because they remained politically neutral and refused to renounce their beliefs.

Police in Hamburg have lifted a warning that was issued to the public after several people were shot and killed inside the Jehovah’s Witnesses Kingdom Hall in the Gross Borstel district.

A police spokesperson told broadcaster NTV that authorities were assuming there was no perpetrator on the run and therefore no further danger to the public in the area, Deutsche Presse-Agentur news agency reported.

Earlier, a police spokesperson told reporters that a body found at the site of the shooting could have been that of the suspect, although this has not been confirmed.

Hamburg’s Mayor Peter Tschentscher tweeted that the reports of the shooting were “shocking” and offered his “deepest sympathy to the families of the victims”.

He said the emergency services were doing their utmost to track down the perpetrator.

Die Meldungen aus Alsterdorf / Groß Borstel sind erschütternd. Den Angehörigen der Opfer gilt mein tiefes Mitgefühl. Die Einsatzkräfte arbeiten mit Hochdruck an der Verfolgung des / der Täter & der Aufklärung der Hintergründe. Bitte beachten Sie die Hinweise der @PolizeiHamburg. https://t.co/38UcdguLzH

— Peter Tschentscher (@TschenPe) March 9, 2023

[Translation: The reports from Alsterdorf/Groß Borstel are shocking. I extend my deepest sympathy to the families of the victims. The emergency services are working at full speed on the prosecution of the perpetrator/clarification of the background. Please note the instructions from the @PolizeiHamburg.]