A mastermind in Lebanon, weapons from Denmark, handover in a park in the capital – the suspicion: The terrorist group could extend the combat zone to Europe.
The firearms seized by investigators in Berlin on a Wednesday in early October are certainly not enough for a war. But they are enough for a bloodbath like the one ten years ago in Paris, at the Bataclan nightclub , when Islamists murdered people in the French capital. And the Kalashnikovs and the eight Glock handguns, along with 525 rounds of 9mm jacketed ammunition, would most certainly be enough to send Germany into a state of shock.
The Kalashnikov rifle lay in a sports bag on the passenger seat of a Škoda Octavia, wrapped in a blue and white patterned dish towel and further secured with foil, when a police special operations unit raided the vehicle on the morning of October 1st. Shouts rang out, handcuffs clicked shut. Three men were arrested: Abed al-G., 37, Wael F., 43, and Ahmad I., 44. They are suspected of belonging to or supporting the Islamist terrorist organization Hamas .
In the weeks that followed, investigators arrested two more men; a sixth suspect is now in prison in London. The trail leads to Malmö, Sweden; Copenhagen, Denmark; Vienna, where five more pistols were found; and Lebanon, to Hamas . It appears that investigators have stumbled upon a Europe-wide terrorist network. One of the two alleged masterminds is still at large, presumably in Lebanon.
Did investigators manage to prevent the war from spilling over into Germany just in time, when Kalashnikovs and pistols – an arsenal rarely seen even among terrorists – had already been delivered? Was Hamas planning a show of force in the heart of Berlin? And who commissioned the plot that the men had apparently been secretly pursuing for months?
The investigation began in the summer when the Israeli intelligence agency Mossad contacted the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (Germany’s domestic intelligence agency). The Israelis warned that “elements with links to terrorist organizations” were involved in the transfer of weapons within Europe. The weapons were “possibly intended for use against Jewish or Israeli targets” and were already in Germany. A clandestine meeting allegedly took place in Berlin, where an initial shipment of pistols was handed over – in Hasenheide Park. The Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA) therefore refers to the case as “Heide” (Heath).
The investigation would later reveal that on July 28th, a Hamas official landed at Berlin airport, whom the Israelis had been monitoring for some time: Mohammed al-F., 39.
Al-F. was born in Erlangen, now lives in Birmingham, England, and is an IT specialist. Most notably, he is the son of Bassem Naim, the former Hamas health minister in the Gaza Strip, who still publicly represents Hamas. One of Al-F.’s cousins was allegedly involved in guarding several Israeli hostages on October 7th. Mohammed al-F. himself enjoys traveling through Europe with a forged Greek driver’s license.
In Berlin, Al-F. rented a holiday apartment in Neukölln, diagonally opposite Hasenheide Park. Late in the evening of July 28, he met in the park with a Berliner named Abed al-G., a Palestinian born in
Lebanon who worked as a hairdresser in Beirut before moving to Germany more than 15 years ago. In photos and videos he uploaded to TikTok, Abed al-G. presents himself as a cool daredevil: He polishes a snow-white BMW, allegedly bought on credit, and cruises around in it. He lifts weights, kisses a live snake, and fans out banknotes. The images show a handsome man with gelled hair and sunglasses, lounging shirtless in a camping chair or partying with friends.
In 2017, Abed al-G. started working as a security guard for a refugee shelter operator in Berlin. He worked his way up to head of security, earning around €4,000 per month. From then on, he was responsible for selecting new employees, checking criminal records, resolving conflicts between residents, and scheduling laundry appointments. “Abed was an exemplary employee,” his former supervisor told ZEIT.
At the same time, there is another, political side to Abed al-G. Images on the internet show him at a pro-Palestinian demonstration. Several of his posts appear to express his delight at terrorist attacks on Israel: “The pigs are afraid,” he writes in Arabic, for example, alongside a video of Israelis fleeing rockets. A description in one of his profiles might also offer a clue to his stance: “Lions’ Den” is written there in Arabic. This name is also used by a militant group founded in 2022 in the West Bank.
And then there’s a picture from March 15, 2023. In it, he’s posing in front of the Berlin refugee shelter, wearing a balaclava and holding a pistol. It was just a firework pistol, Abed al-G’s brother claims when ZEIT meets him for an interview. A joke. But the superior officer remembers: Al-G once sent him a picture from a vacation in Lebanon, in which he was posing with a Kalashnikov. Almost everyone there owns one of those at home, Al-G explained to his boss.
Abed al-G. is clearly familiar with weapons – and apparently has access to them in Berlin as well. On the evening of July 28, after Hamas member Mohammed al-F. landed in Berlin, Abed al-G. is said to have handed him five pistols in Hasenheide Park. After the meeting, Mohammed al-F. traveled by train to Vienna, where he apparently stashed the weapons. It wasn’t until weeks later that Austrian investigators found the five pistols hidden away.
However, Abed al-G. makes an embarrassing mistake during the handover of the weapons. A courier from Copenhagen smuggled the ammunition to Berlin, 80 “dates” in total, as the men on the phone say. The “dates” are intended for the “machines,” as Abed al-G. calls the pistols. To clarify what’s going on, he imitates the sound of muzzle flash over the phone: tah, tah, tah.
But as the courier was making his way back to Denmark after delivering the ammunition, he was stopped by police. The officers searched him and found $2,500 in cash, apparently payment for the weapons and ammunition. However, they had to let the courier go; the money alone wasn’t enough for an arrest. The courier then sent a warning.
When the usually cool-headed Abed al-G. learns about the search of the courier’s home, he panics. He felt like he was being followed, he later recounts in a phone call overheard by investigators. And because he still had the bag full of “dates” at home, he drove to the Spree River, scared as a hare, as he puts it, and threw the “dates” into the water. He just wanted to get rid of the stuff. Weeks later, police divers actually find 80 rounds of ammunition in the Spree near the Michael Bridge, just a 15-minute walk from al-G.’s apartment.
Without ammunition, firearms are useless. Abed al-G. is therefore tasked with procuring new ammunition. He wanders through Neukölln, approaching various acquaintances. He needs at least 100 “dates,” he tells a friend. After a few days, he apparently finds someone who can help him.
Investigators are now deeply concerned: they know that the case really does involve weapons. And they have noted that the courier from Copenhagen had checked into the Hotel Martas Berlin Mitte, which is directly adjacent to the building of the German-Israeli Society Berlin and Brandenburg and only a few hundred meters from the New Jewish Synagogue on Oranienburger Straße. Was the visit not only for the purpose of smuggling weapons, but also to scout out potential targets?
Shortly afterward, the Israelis contacted them again: Another Hamas supporter had travelled from Rødby to Germany via Fehmarn by ferry. Possibly a second arms shipment. The handover of the first five pistols had escaped the investigators’ notice. This must not happen again.
And indeed: at the end of August, the man re-entered Germany. Investigators observed him driving to Oberhausen. They watched as, late at night on August 26, he heaved a heavy sports bag from the trunk of his car and handed it to an intermediary. An oblong object protruded from the bag. Was it the Kalashnikov? The intermediary then drove the weapons to Berlin. There, they were found during a raid on October 1.
Investigators now believe they have identified the mastermind behind the arms smuggling operation: Adnan A., 37, a stateless Palestinian from Malmö, who is a friend of Abed al-G. The Federal Prosecutor’s Office has long suspected Adnan A. of planning an attack. In 2023, Adnan A. gave a friend in Berlin a USB stick containing geodata of the Israeli embassy in Berlin and the US airbase in Ramstein, Rhineland-Palatinate. The stick also contained waypoints to possible Hamas weapons caches in Poland.
The office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accused Adnan A. of being a Hamas operative in Europe about two years ago. He was said to be subordinate to a high-ranking commander in the Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas. Shortly after being exposed, Adnan A. left Malmö, presumably to avoid reprisals. Since then, investigators believe he has been directing the network from Lebanon.
It’s unlikely one would smuggle a Kalashnikov and a dozen handguns across Europe, eight pistols to Berlin and five to Vienna, to equip security for a fundraising gala. The weapons were presumably intended for use in attacks. But against what target? The synagogue on Oranienburger Straße or the German-Israeli Society? The Israeli embassy, which had already been spied on previously? And is Hamas or a splinter group really behind it?
The Israeli government cites indications that Hamas views Europe as a “localized terrorist action zone,” an extension of its combat area. The organization needs a success, something major. On the other hand, Hamas would have much to lose from a spectacular attack in Europe. Even the aura of Hamas as alleged resistance fighters, cultivated in radical anti-Israel circles, would be jeopardized after such an act against civilians. This political capital would be instantly lost in an attack in Germany.
It remains unclear who is actually in command within Hamas, who dictates the political strategy, and who issues the orders. Is it the remaining leadership of the Qassam Brigades in the Gaza Strip? The members of the Hamas political bureau in Qatar? Or individual commanders in Lebanon? As with the Northern Irish IRA, a radical faction may have broken away and is acting independently, German investigators speculate, possibly to sabotage the fragile peace process in the Gaza Strip. A bloodbath in Berlin or Vienna would likely lead the Israeli government to resume its attacks.
The Federal Prosecutor General claims the detainees are “foreign operatives for Hamas,” a view shared by a judge of the Federal Court of Justice. The Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV) is more cautious in its assessment: Adnan A., the Hamas operative in Lebanon, manages “individuals who are connected to him,” who are mostly “criminal proxies, but not Hamas operatives.” Their involvement is intended to “distance the plot from Hamas.” In this underground machination, an attack would help Hamas but would not be attributed to them. Therefore, according to the BfV, “no proof can be provided” that the individuals in Germany have any connection to Hamas beyond personal contact with Adnan A. The lawyer Khubaib Ali Mohammed, who represents Abed al-G. He argues that “it is unclear whether individual persons may have merely acted as criminal accomplices. The extent to which each person involved actually had an extremist connection must be clarified by the investigating authorities and, if necessary, later by a court.” Abed al-G. is in pretrial detention in Germany, as are two of the couriers. Mohammed al-F. is awaiting extradition from the United Kingdom to Germany. Adnan A. is in hiding in Lebanon.
