On 8 September 2020, the 10th day of the Halle trial, several Jewish survivors gave their remarkable testimonies to the horrific crime. The crime took place on 9 October 2019 on Yom Kippur, the holiest day in the Jewish calendar. Stephan B. killed two people and injured many more in a terror attack in Halle, Germany. Among the testimonies, one survivor pointed out German domestic intelligence and police's incapability to deal with social media and the gaming community that surrounded the attack.
Stephan B., so it appears, had radicalized himself online and had published several files that included a live stream on Twitch, and on the imageboard Meguca shortly before his attack. The documents that he uploaded show a worldview of ‘extermination antisemitism’ (Vernichtungsantisemitismus) interconnected with misogyny, racism, Islamophobia, and incitement. “Go in and kill everything,” he wrote in bold letters.
Even though Stephan B. is a native German, he spoke mostly English during the live stream. He also wrote his documents in English. This attests to his connections to global radical online communities and the alt-right, with a particular receptivity for the gaming and manga community, rather than to traditional German right-wing extremist networks.
