German Chancellor Angela Merkel condemned Thursday the "poison" of racism, hours after the killing of nine people, including many of Kurdish descent, with German bullets with "xenophobic" motives in two shootings in two hookah cafes in the city of Hanau near Frankfurt.
"Racism is poison, hatred is poison, and this poison is in our society, and responsibility for many crimes falls," Merkel told reporters, referring to a series of crimes and attacks committed by new Nazis in the 2000s and the killing of a pro-immigration politician in June, and the attack on a synagogue that killed two people in October.
Earlier, German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier said he stood with "all the people who are threatened with racial hatred," expressing his horror at "terrorist violence in Hanau."
The county’s home minister, Peter Booth, said that a potential shooter whom German media had known as Tobias R. A, a 43-year-old German, was found dead Thursday morning in his apartment next to his mother’s body, referring to “a motive of xenophobia.”
On Wednesday evening, the "Midnight" hookah cafe was targeted in the center of Hanau, which is about 100,000 people and 20 kilometers from Frankfurt, before the shooter moved in a car to the "Arena Bar" cafe in Kurt-Schumacher-Platz in the Kesselstadt district.
Reports said that the attacker entered the second cafe and shot those in the smokers' corner, killing five, including a woman, according to Bild newspaper, which added that the dead were of Kurdish origin.
"The victims are people we have known for years," the German news agency quoted the cafe owner as saying. He said that two of the coffee shop's employees were among the dead, adding that neither he nor his father were in the café at the time of the attack. "It is a shock to everyone," he said.
The death toll has risen from eight initially, to nine, after a person died of his wounds.
On Thursday, the public prosecutor in charge of counterterrorism affairs took charge of the investigation, asserting that it possessed "elements that support the hypothesis of the motive of xenophobia."
Among the dead were "victims of Kurdish origin", as the Confederation of Kurdistan Groups in Germany announced, accusing German leaders of "not resolutely combating extremist right-wing terrorism."
According to sources close to the investigation, a confession letter and a video were found. Peter Newman, a terrorism expert at King's College University in London, said the message was "24 pages long" and reflected "xenophobia and non-whites".
Newman wrote on Twitter that the author of the letter "calls for the extermination of several countries in North Africa, the Middle East and Central Asia" using "terms explicitly calling for eugenics, confirming that science proves that some races are superior".
The suspect says he was "all of his life watched by the intelligence services" and describes himself as "an involuntary celibate" and "admits that he has never had a relationship with a woman," according to Newman.
Investigators also found the suspect's car that contained ammunition, according to local media who added that he was carrying a hunting license.
About ten people gathered Thursday in front of the two shooting locations. "I know very well the people who were in the cafe," said Ahmed, who has been a resident of the neighborhood for 30 years. "What happened was not a natural thing. I would have been in their position."
Another woman said, "I don't understand it, we had no racist problems here."
In Brussels, many leaders expressed their solidarity with Angela Merkel before the opening of the European summit.
French President Emmanuel Macron said he was "standing by" the chancellor, while the head of the European-German Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, expressed her "shocked by the views of the tragedy."