Dresden, Germany - Two Bombs Explode - Uncle Sam's Misguided Children : Uncle Sam's Misguided Children

Two bombs exploded in Dresden, Germany on Monday night, one at a Turkish Mosque, and one at the International Congress Center. No injuries, minimal damage. Authorities are considering a “xenophobic” direction for the investigation.

The incident

One device exploded at 10 p.m. at the Fatih Camii Turkish Mosque. The next one exploded at 10:19 p.m. at Dresden’s International Congress Center. Police believe the bombings are connected.

The devices were homemade, and fragments of the device were found at the International Center.

CNN reported,

“Both attacks happened in the same time. Although no one claimed responsibility for the incident, we must have to consider a xenophobic motive for the attack,” Horst Kretzschmar, the city’s police chief in Dresden said in a statement, adding that police were on high alert.

Overnight, Kretzschmar had deployed police personnel to protect Islamic institutions in Dresden, as well as the Turkish General Council.

“The attack might also be relevant to the German Unity Day, which will be celebrated next weekend,” he said.

The explosion was from a homemade explosive device. Surveillance camera footage captured a suspect placing an object in front of home of the mosque’s imam and his family. Eyewitnesses said a man on a motorcycle fled the scene after the attack, according to the Andalou Agency.

Inset- the Fatih Camii mosque and damage to the door

Several possibilities for suspects

Dresden is in the German state of Saxony, which is the home of PEGIDA, the right-wing movement in Germany. Muslims call them xenophobic, Islamophobic. They are anti-migrant and vocal, and definitely on the rise in Germany.

That’s likely where the investigation will be focused. However…

The Fatih Camii mosque is a Turkish one. There was another firebombing of a Turkish Mosque over the weekend in Hessen, Germany. A DITIB mosque in the city of Brebar was also firebombed as well. DITIB is the Turkish-Islamic Union for Religious Affairs.

Since the damage was minimal, and no one was injured, it makes you wonder about the perpetrator.

The International Congress Center in Dresden, Germany. Inset- where the homemade bomb went off

The Daily Sabah wrote,

The incidents come in the wake of what the DİTİB has claimed a defamation campaign by German politicians. The DİTİB was critical of the statements “that amount to outright hostility” after three politicians from different political parties claimed the association was under the influence of the Turkish government and therefore, should not be allowed to shape Islamic religious education in Germany.

Mosques in Germany, where anti-Muslim sentiment accompanying the influx of Muslim refugees rises, are occasionally subject to attacks, ranging from Molotov cocktails to tossing of pig’s heads. A Turkish parliamentary committee investigating the targeting of mosques found some 297 attacks against mosques between 2001 and 2014 and they mostly targeted Turkish mosques.

Are these attacks the product of “xenophobic” Germans or something else entirely?

Dresden, Germany – Two Bombs Explode