A Palestinian jihadist who killed one man and wounded six other people in a German supermarket knife rampage last year was sentenced on Thursday to life in prison.
Ahmad Alhaw, 27, had admitted to the murder and assaults in the river port city of Hamburg.
In delivering the sentence, the judge noted the “particular severity” of the crime, lowering Alhaw’s chances of obtaining early release on parole.
Justice Norbert Sakuth said Alhaw, with his “unstable personality”, had acted alone after falling prey to the propaganda of the so-called Islamic State jihadist group, adding that “in this way the IS succeeded”.
Prosecutors told the court Alhaw had hoped to kill as many German Christians as possible to avenge the suffering of Muslims worldwide, and had hoped “he would die as a martyr”.
Alhaw entered a supermarket on July 28, snatched a 20-centimetre (eight-inch) knife from the shelves, unwrapped it and fatally stabbed a 50-year-old man.
As panic broke out, he slashed and stabbed at others inside and then outside the shop, and also wounding a 50-year-old woman and four men.
“I saw him run toward me, covered in blood. He was radiating bloodlust,” a 20-year-old supermarket worker who locked himself in a backroom recounted in court.
Justice Sakuth said about the attacker that “if he could have, he would have killed more people”. Outside the supermarket, seven mostly migrant bystanders confronted the screaming attacker, hurling rocks and chairs at him and then subduing him until police arrived.