DW Berlin Briefing - Inside German politics
Jul 28, 2026 · 33 min · 11 segments
The attack on Berlin Pride has triggered a political debate. Calls for tougher security measures are getting louder, and pressure is mounting on Friedrich Merz's government amid cabinet reshuffling…
Rebecca SchönenbachGuest
Michaela KüfnerHost
Nina HaaseHost
Let's just start with what Friedrich Merz, the German chancellor, said in response to that attack.
It is still too early to say which political conclusions we will draw from this brutal attack.
But it is clear that we can't stop at condemnation.
We will have to respond with prudence and determination, and above all, answer the question: how can it be possible for a man classified this way, here in Berlin, to go unhindered to the area of the Christopher Street Day event on Saturday evening and carry out this attack? The goal of the attack was not chosen at random, nor was it an attack directed solely at the queer community.
It was an attack on our freedom.
You just heard German Chancellor Friedrich Merz react to the Islamist terror attack that has shaken Berlin and Germany when on Saturday a 21-year-old extremist steered his rental van into the Berlin Pride gathering near the Brandenburg Gate.
This attack is, first of all, a human tragedy, and it's raising a lot of questions for Chancellor Merz and his government, and that's why it's Berlin Briefing time early this week.
Over the next half hour or so, we'll look at how it could happen that a listed Islamist offender who was under police surveillance was walking the streets of Berlin and was able to attack a peaceful crowd, and we assess the political fallout for the chancellor and his conservative CDU party, both already suffering in the polls.
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Let's just start with what Friedrich Merz, the German chancellor, said in response to that attack.
It is still too early to say which political conclusions we will draw from this brutal attack.
But it is clear that we can't stop at condemnation.
We will have to respond with prudence and determination, and above all, answer the question: how can it be possible for a man classified this way, here in Berlin, to go unhindered to the area of the Christopher Street Day event on Saturday evening and carry out this attack? The goal of the attack was not chosen at random, nor was it an attack directed solely at the queer community.
It was an attack on our freedom.
You just heard German Chancellor Friedrich Merz react to the Islamist terror attack that has shaken Berlin and Germany when on Saturday a 21-year-old extremist steered his rental van into the Berlin Pride gathering near the Brandenburg Gate.
This attack is, first of all, a human tragedy, and it's raising a lot of questions for Chancellor Merz and his government, and that's why it's Berlin Briefing time early this week.
Over the next half hour or so, we'll look at how it could happen that a listed Islamist offender who was under police surveillance was walking the streets of Berlin and was able to attack a peaceful crowd, and we assess the political fallout for the chancellor and his conservative CDU party, both already suffering in the polls.
