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Local Germany
27-05-2025
- Politics
- Local Germany
How German media reveals its bias when foreigners commit crimes
A shocking incident occurred in Hamburg last Friday, when a 39-year-old woman – reportedly suffering from severe mental health issues – injured 18 people at the city's main railway station in a mass stabbing attack. Four of the victims – three women and one man – sustained what were initially described as life-threatening injuries. Updated reports said all 18 victims were in a stable condition and recovering well. The incident has raised questions about bias is German media reporting. In Germany the ethnicity of attackers only seems to be highlighted when they are foreigners. In this case, the heroic actions of a Syrian refugee were also largely ignored. A heroic act The number of victims of the Hamburg attack – and the severity of their injuries – could easily have been worse, if not for the courage and heroism of two men who happened to be on the scene. When Muhammad Al Muhammad, 19, saw people on the platform running away from a woman wielding a knife, he chose to run in the opposite direction in other words towards the woman to try and stop her, according to reporting by Der Spiegel . A second man, reportedly of Chechen origin, kicked the attacker in the knee, causing her to fall and allowing Muhammad to restrain her effectively. Muhammad comes from Aleppo and arrived in Germany in 2022. Commenting on the story for Taz , journalist Gilda Sahebi made a point of highlighting his background. Sahebi wrote : 'The political and public debate is now so dripping with racist toxicity spread by a far-right party and its influencers in the media and on social media, but also by democratic political and media actors, that it is necessary to tell the story of Muhammad Al Muhammad.' Advertisement Immigrants more often portrayed as villains in German media According to police statistics for 2023, native Germans were the suspects or perpetrators in 66.7 percent of violent crimes. In the same year, Germany's television news stations devoted 84.2 percent of its reporting on violent crimes to cases in which a foreigner had been identified as a suspect, according to analysis by Dr. Thomas Hestermann at Hochschule Macromedia in Hamburg. Hestermann found the same bias in German print media, with 82 percent of its violent crime coverage focused on foreign perpetrators. READ ALSO: Why experts say Germany's rising crime rate is misleading To give a more recent example: in February, an immigrant from Afghanistan drove into a crowd in Munich . In March, a German man drove into a crowd in Mannheim . Two nearly identical crimes, but media analysis indicates that the former received almost twice as much attention as the latter. Advertisement What are the rules on crime reporting in Germany? In recent years, the Deutsche Presserat (German Press Council) has repeatedly updated its guidelines in an attempt to address long-standing concerns about potential discrimination and bias in crime reporting. According to the guidelines, the media should avoid mentioning the ethnicity, religion, or other minority status of suspects or perpetrators unless there is a justified public interest. The guideline is rarely followed in practice, however, with many editors and journalists reluctant to keep this information from the public. Critics argue that omitting such information can create suspicion among readers and lead to accusations of a lack of transparency or censorship. In response, campaigners have suggested that the ethnicity and religion of all suspects should be included in reports – so far without success. As a result, the words ' Einwanderer ' (immigrant) or "Ausländer" (foreigner) appear alongside the words "Gewaltverbrechen" (violent crime) with wildly disproportionate regularity. How was the case resolved in Hamburg? The person who attacked so many people with a knife at Hamburg Main Station is in police custody. A police spokesman at the scene was quick to reassure reporters that there did not appear to be any political motive for the attack. Instead, he said, the police were 'pursuing the theory that the suspect may have been experiencing a psychological emergency.' While it is absolutely right to hope that she receives the medical care and attention she needs, it is also legitimate to wonder whether the police and the German media would have shown such understanding if the perpetrator had been a man from Syria or Afghanistan. According to reports in Bild , Muhammad Al Muhammad has become the target of online disinformation campaigns. Despite his heroism – and public expressions of gratitude from the police – numerous fake images that cast doubt on his existence and fuel and conspiracy theories are already circulating on social media.
The Guardian
26-05-2025
- Politics
- The Guardian
Syrian refugee, 19, praised after pinning down assailant in Hamburg knife attack
A 19-year-old Syrian refugee in Germany has been hailed as a hero after he pinned down an assailant at Hamburg's main railway station, helping to halt an attack in which 18 people were injured. Police on Friday said a 39-year-old German woman had been arrested at the scene of the attack and that she was believed to be in a state of psychological distress. The 18 people injured were later reported to all be in stable condition, while the woman was placed in psychiatric care. As the city reeled from the incident, the spotlight landed on Muhammad Al Muhammad, who had been heading to his home in Buchholz, some 25km from Hamburg, after visiting a friend in the city. He was waiting on the platform for his train when he spotted a woman wielding a knife. He watched as people began running away from the woman. 'I decided to run in the other direction and stop the woman,' he told the German news magazine Der Spiegel. As he made his way, he saw another man, who he described as Chechen, kick the woman in the knee, leading her to fall to the ground. 'I held her [down] and pressed her hands against her rucksack so she couldn't get up,' he said. 'The woman didn't scream, she didn't resist.' Police arrived a few moments later. As they pointed their weapons towards them, Muhammad moved away from the woman slowly, his hands raised in the air. Der Spiegel, which said it had verified Muhammad's identity, noted that the actions of the two men had probably prevented more people from being injured. News of their actions soon began to make waves across Germany, with some contrasting it to the sustained efforts by the far-right, anti-immigrant party Alternative für Deutschland, to link migration to crime, even as a recent study by the Munich-based Ifo Institute found there was 'no correlation' between migration and higher crime rates. Many in German media have seemingly also echoed this association; a 2023 analysis found that both print and television media reported five times more on violent crimes when the suspect was a foreigner in Germany, the broadcaster Deutsche Welle recently noted. Against this backdrop, it was crucial to share the story of Muhammad, who is originally from near Aleppo and arrived in Germany as a refugee in 2022, the journalist and political commentator Gilda Sahebi wrote in Germany's Die Tageszeitung newspaper. 'One is tempted to say: 'See? An Arab – his name is Muhammad, no less – is a hero!'' Sahebi wrote. 'The political and public debate is now so dripping with racist toxicity, spread by a far-right party and its influencers in media and social media, but also by democratic political and media actors, that it is necessary to tell the story of Muhammad Al Muhammad.' Muhammad said that, following the attack, he had been questioned by police before eventually making his way home. 'The police thanked me and bought me a cappuccino,' he said. 'That made me very happy.'
