There were just a few hours to go before a coronavirus curfew was due to go into effect in Austria.
And that was when the gunmen chose to strike in Vienna, unleashing a deadly rampage Monday that left four dead and at least 15 wounded in multiple locations in the city in what Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz labeled a “repulsive terror attack.”
Officials in the Austrian capital say they’re still unsure how many assailants were involved in an attack apparently planned to take advantage of people thronging bars and restaurants to enjoy a final night out before the lockdown.
Witnesses said they thought several men fired into bars and restaurants around Schwedenplatz on the Danube canal. One video posted online by a witness showed a gunman wearing a white tracksuit shooting at a man several times with an automatic weapon, before returning seconds later to shoot him with a handgun.
One suspected killer was shot dead by police. According to Interior Minister Karl Nehammer, he was Kujtim Fejzulai, a 20-year-old Islamic State sympathizer with dual Austrian and Macedonian nationality, who’d been convicted previously of a terror offense for trying to travel to Syria to join the group.
Later Tuesday the Austrian chancellor cast doubt on whether there was more than one gunman, saying, “We know there was at least one gunman, probably he was alone.” But he added that investigators are now trying to discover whether he had logistical support from others. “We are trying to find out if the attacker was part of a broader network,” he said. The Austrian leader did not explain why some people caught up in the shooting reported more than a single gunman was involved.
Sorry, but your browser cannot support embedded video of this type, you can to view it offline.
ISIS officially claimed responsibility Tuesday for the attack, releasing via its Amaq News Agency a 44-second video of Fejzulai pledging allegiance to the terror group’s leader Abu Ibrahim al-Hashimi al-Qurashi. The assailant’s nom de guerre was given as Abu Dujana al-Albani.
Hours after the video was posted, police in Switzerland announced they had arrested two people in connection with the terror attack in Vienna, Austria — an 18-year-old and a 24-year-old. The arrests were made in Winterthur in a joint operation with Austrian authorities. Last month, Swiss police secured a successful prosecution against an ISIS recruiter based in Winterthur.
Fejzulai was sentenced to 22 months in April 2019 for trying to join IS but was freed last December. “He was equipped with a fake explosive belt, an automatic rifle, a handgun and a machete to commit this repugnant attack on innocent citizens,” Nehammer said.
Gerhard Pürstl, Vienna’s police chief, said Fejzulai was “neutralized” within nine minutes after starting the attack with seven police officers firing their weapons at him.
Police say they have launched a manhunt for at least one more assailant. On Monday, as the attack unfolded in six locations, starting near a synagogue, they had said there were “several suspects armed with rifles.” The discrepancy in numbers is yet to be explained. Austrian police arrested two people Tuesday near Vienna in their nationwide manhunt for possible accomplices.
Until Monday, Austria had been spared the kind of major attacks that have hit other European countries, notably Germany, Britain and France, which last week suffered a spate of attacks by Islamist militants.
“We often see Austria as an island of the blessed in which one only sees violence and terror from the reports on foreign countries,” Kurz said in a statement. “But the sad truth is that although we are lucky to live in a basically very safe country, our world is anything but safe,” he added.
The resurgence of jihadist-inspired terror attacks in Europe after a lull, first in France, now in Austria, is prompting rising alarm among European security officials that they are once again facing a coordinated terrorism wave, possibly managed by overseas plotters, or at least heavily inspired by them. They note last week’s attack on a church in Nice, like Monday’s in Vienna, unfolded on the eve of a national lockdown.
British counterterrorism expert Olivier Guitta tweeted within minutes of the shooting spree in the Austrian capital: “Important to note that the multiple terror attacks in #Vienna, #Austria happened on the last evening before Austria goes into lockdown. The #Nice attack at the church also took place the day before #France went into lockdown.”