Gavin Grey: UK correspondent on five people getting arrested over plot to attack German Christmas market

Five people were arrested in Germany after they were suspected of being involved in a plot to drive a vehicle into people at a Christmas market.

The group were detained over the plan to target a market in the southern Bavarian state.

UK correspondent Gavin Grey explains further.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Ryan Bridge.

Speaker 2 (00:01):
Get to Gavin Gray in the UK, Gavin, good evening,
good morning to you.

Speaker 3 (00:05):
Good evening there An how's the UK.

Speaker 2 (00:07):
Reacting to the sterera tech in Sydney?

Speaker 1 (00:10):
Yep, lots of different celebrations of Hannekah, but of course
remembering their lost ones in their community. In Australia, a
crowd of around one hundred gathered outside the Australian High
Commission in central London for a vigil, people waving British
Israeli flag, some just the sign stop the hate, and

(00:33):
the rabbi one of the rabbis attending the vigil said
don't be afraid, we should celebrate Hannekah and then at
Trafalgar Square a large manara was lit up to mark
the first day of the festival. With hundreds of others
also attending Hannock events in Northwest London. So there is
a definite sign that there's an increased police presence in

(00:54):
and around these events taking place, but obviously huge sadness
with one of the dead victims named as a British
born rabbi here with family still in London, and some
tense times as well after Benjaminette and Yah who Israeli
leader comments, you know, effectively saying, well, there's countries where

(01:14):
these attacks have allowed it to happen, have allowed the
cancer to fester. And of course we remember back in
Manchester where two people were killed in an attack on
a synagogue on Yom Kippur. So a great deal of
concern for the safety of Jews gathering for various celebrations.

Speaker 2 (01:32):
Absolutely, and for people gathering generally in Germany.

Speaker 3 (01:36):
What's going on in Germany?

Speaker 1 (01:38):
Yeah, I think this story's kind of gone under the radar.
This is because they just haven't really advertised or put
out and publicized what's been going on. But five people
have been arrested in Germany on suspicion of being involved
in a plot to drive a vehicle into people at
a Christmas market. They are three Moroccans, an Egyptian, and
Assyrian and they've all been detained in the south of

(02:01):
Bavaria and authorities say they do suspect an Islamist motive.
According to the prosecutors, the Egyptian, who's a fifty six
year old, is alleged called for a vehicle attack with
the aim of killing or injuring as many as possible,
and the Moroccans are allegedly agreed to carry out the event.
Now the authorities don't say which market when it was planned,

(02:24):
but the German newspaper Built is reporting the Egyptian man
was an imam at a mosque in the area, and
there are there have been a number of attacks on
Christmas markets in Germany, perhaps the most significant in twenty
sixteen in Berlin, when a man drove a lorry into
a crowd, killing twelve people but injuring hundreds of others.

Speaker 3 (02:47):
And finally, the winner of last year's Eurovision Song contests
said that they're going to give their trophy back.

Speaker 1 (02:54):
What for? Yes, Nemo says they're going to give their
trophy back, and that is because and they don't agree
with Israel's continued participation in the event. The twenty six
year old Swiss singer says there's a clear conflict between
Israel's involvement in the competition and what's going on in

(03:14):
Gaza and the ideals of unity, inclusion and dignity that
the contest says that it stands for now. They of
course have four countries, indeed five now because another one's
joined them Iceland, Spain, Ireland, Slovenia and the Netherlands have
announced they were boycott next year's event because Israel has
been allowed to compete. Very controversial last year in Israel

(03:36):
nearly one with a huge public vote, but that was
with each person allowed to vote twenty times, and of
course the public vote was massive for Israel. And really
the Eurovision bosses have got a court between a rock
and a hard place here because they've decided not to
ban Israel, and Germany, for instance, was saying that it

(03:58):
would boycott if they did ban Israel, so they are
stuck in this. You know, this should all be beyond politics,
but quite frankly, I don't think it can be.

Speaker 3 (04:07):
No, it doesn't sound like it either, Gevin. Thank you
for that. Kevin Gray, our UK correspondent with US tonight

Speaker 1 (04:13):
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